Deducing Hogwarts
by summerlinde
Summary: John is pretty sure that sitting together on the train on the way to school is not really a good reason to be best friends with someone, but he can't quite stop himself from being best friends with Sherlock anyway. By the time their investigations start, it's too late to be anything else. Sherlock characters at Hogwarts.
1. Deductions on the Hogwarts Express

Eleven-year-old John Watson lugged his trunk toward the train, trying to convince himself that he was not upset about having left his parents on the other side of the brick wall, back in King's Cross proper with the other muggles, that he was not awed by what was, technically, nothing more than a train platform, and that he was not the _slightest_ bit intimidated by the thought of trying to get his trunk from the platform to the train itself. Mostly, it seemed to be working, because while he wasn't sure he believed any of it himself, he seemed to have the other people on the platform convinced that he knew exactly where he was going and what he was doing.

John was a small boy for his age, he always had been, and he'd found in primary school that competence – not cockiness, but competence – was the easiest way to make up for it. People noticed less that he was small and round-faced and a little bit tubby if he also looked like he was in control of himself and like he wasn't the type of person people usually bullied, and it seemed to be working here as well as it had in the normal world. That was a relief. At least some things were the same here.

At the door of the train, he took a deep breath, rearranging his grip on his trunk as he did so that it looked like he knew he could do it and not like he was reassuring himself, and tried to heft it over the gap between the platform and the train all by himself. He almost even managed it, before a spiking pain ran down from his shoulder to his hand and he nearly dropped it entirely. The trunk wobbled, John wobbled, and then a strong hand reached out from inside the train and caught the trunk's handle, pulling gently and steadying them both. The hand was followed by the rest of the person it belonged to, a tall, round-faced older boy with neat brown hair, a shining silver badge pinned to the front of his pinstriped robes, and an umbrella hooked over his opposite wrist. "Here, let me help you with that."

John shoved up the sleeves of his tan jumper, straightened his spine and answered, "It's alright, I've got it." Then with another try, he hefted the trunk the rest of the way into the train and then stepped across after it, trying not to let the older boy see that he'd tweaked his shoulder again. It hadn't quite healed yet from his bike accident a week ago.

Now that he was closer to the older boy, he could read the badge on his chest. It said, "Head Boy." John almost blushed. "Um, I mean, thanks though," he mumbled, hoping he hadn't insulted the boy by refusing to take his help. It wouldn't do to insult the head boy before he even got to school. But the boy didn't seem insulted. He seemed calculating, looking John up and down for a few moments in a way that made John want to fidget. But he didn't. He stood perfectly still, back straight, and looked back at the stranger, meeting the boy's eyes as if he, too, were measuring the older boy. He wasn't _afraid_, after all.

"Yes," the boy said decisively, "You'll do."

John frowned. "I'll do what?"

The boy looked him up and down once again, eyes twinkling this time, and announced. "You'll do nicely. Follow me, please." John's forehead wrinkled. That wasn't an answer, and he didn't like not having answers. But he also knew that causing trouble when he'd only just managed to get to the train would not be a good start to this whole Hogwarts endeavor, so he picked up his trunk and followed along, trailing obediently behind the head boy for the moment. If he didn't like where this was going, he could make a break for it.

The other students got quickly out of their way as the head boy stalked down the train, carrying his umbrella imperiously by his side, but they didn't say anything, either to John _or _to the boy. Given the many conversations he'd been surrounded by since crossing through the wall about how no one had seen each other since the end of last term and wasn't it good to be together again and hadn't the summer been wonderful and wasn't it going to be a wonderful year, that seemed like a bad sign. Did no one want to catch up with this boy's doings of the summer? But perhaps not. He had an air about him that almost made John not want to know anything about him at all. Either that or he wanted to know everything. He wasn't sure yet.

As they came to a halt, John decided that he'd prefer not to know anything. The boy was giving him that calculated look again, as if double checking that John hadn't changed in the last three minutes, and John half wondered if he might prefer never to have met this boy at all, because he looked like he might be deciding whether to throw him into a tank full of sharks or not.

Then the 7th-year (because obviously that's what he was, if he was head boy, wasn't he?) opened the door with a flourish and ushered John through it, holding his umbrella out as if pointing the way. Inside the compartment was a boy who looked just about as much like John's opposite as another white boy could be. Even sitting scrunched in the corner, huddled over a book, the boy was clearly tall and even more clearly thin, his cheekbones standing out sharply from his face and his bony wrists sticking out of the sleeves of the plain black uniform robes he'd already put on. His hair was dark and curly (John's was light brown, barely a shade darker than blond, and while it _could _curl, it didn't, not unless he grew it out quite a bit longer than his mother liked it to be) and the eyes gazing briefly up at them were blue, though a bit greyed by the distance between the door and the corner of the compartment.

As John and the boy in the corner surveyed each other, the head boy slid John's hand away from his trunk and hefted it up onto the overhead shelf with a grunt. John's eyes widened and he turned toward the head boy again, but before he could say anything, the boy in the corner spoke, making John turn halfway around to look at him, too. "You know, I _can_ find my own friends, thank you, Mycroft."

The older boy laughed. "Yes, but I also know you _won't,_ Sherlock. And a boy needs friends. Can't get along without them in this world. And he's a good one."

Ah. That explained it, then. This Mycroft boy had mistaken him for someone else. Probably some young wizard from a _wizard_ family who looked a bit like him. How embarrassing. John cleared his throat. "I . . . ah . . . I think there might've been-"

The boy in the corner interrupted. "Oh, no, John, don't worry, there hasn't been a mix-up. Mycroft's just irritating like this. And I'm sure he hasn't told you anything. Melodramatic git."

John's forehead wrinkled again. He hadn't told either boy his name, and he'd only been in here for a few minutes, and was the boy in the corner _really_ going to just sit here and insult the head boy? "I . . . what?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes, but Mycroft's face split into a grin. "See! Friends already. I'll just leave you two to it." And then he let himself out, closing the compartment door behind him, and John stared after him for a moment, still confused, and not entirely certain what Mycroft was leaving him and Sherlock _to_.

By the time John realized that he didn't have a prayer of getting his trunk down on his own to leave, at least not with his shoulder still twinging a bit, Mycroft was gone, as if by magic. No matter how hard John strained his eyes to look down the corridor, there was no sign of the boy. And then the train started moving and the last few people from the corridors ducked into nearby compartments and it was too late. John closed the compartment door, wishing he hadn't hesitated before going after Mycroft, and eased into the nearest seat, across from Sherlock and away from the window. "So . . . um . . . hi," he said hesitantly.

The boy had gone back to his book, but now he closed it with a snap and placed it on the seat beside him, leaning back into a slouch that made him look even taller and steepling his fingers in front of his face so that as he looked at John, he peered over them. "Hello."

Now Sherlock was giving him the same sort of look Mycroft had given him earlier, as if he were studying him down to his pores, but when Sherlock did it, he looked more curious and less judgmental. Also considerably less terrifying, though that might have been the slouch, which really was quite spectacular. John almost wondered for a moment if Sherlock might not actually have bones in his spine, but of course, that was ridiculous.

The silence was awkward, though John noted absently that it was perhaps not _quite_ so awkward as it could be, all things considered. Even so, it was more comfortable to fill the silence with something, and as strange as this boy and the one who had brought him here both were, it was always best to be polite.

He started to introduce himself. "I'm-"

Sherlock interrupted again. "John H. Watson. First year. Muggle born. Father is military, mother is a housewife." He stopped for a moment, but John could tell he wasn't done, because his eyes had half closed into something a bit like a glare and a bit like a cat being petted, and he was still studying John like he was a puzzle that needed worked out.

"One older sibling, but not here – he's not got any magic, so he can't come and probably resents it. Or will. But my guess is that he resents it already. But he's not how you got the shoulder injury. That's older, almost better now, you're annoyed with it for not being better quite yet. I'd have guessed you fell off your broom, but that's ridiculous, isn't it, you're muggleborn, so it was probably a bicycle – no, _definitely _a bicycle, but you weren't doing something stupid on it, because you're not stupid, are you, you're perfectly average."

John had no idea what to make of all those words one right after the other – Sherlock was right, but he was also racing like he was trying to win a speed-talking competition. It made John's head spin a bit, so he said nothing, and then Sherlock started right back to talking, a little bit slower this time. "Maybe a bit above. We'll have to see. Also a Gryffindor. I bet Mycroft thinks you'll be a Hufflepuff, that's why he's willing to set you up as a friend for me, but he's wrong. Gryffindor. That's alright, he's wrong about me, too. Thinks I'll be in Slytherin like him, but I'm going Ravenclaw. I'm cleverer than he is anyway."

John couldn't help himself. He laughed. "Cleverer?" Sherlock looked confused, and John was vaguely aware that he probably should too. But he didn't feel confused. He felt elated, somehow, and he _had _to know how the boy had done it. Because surely he was reading John's mind somehow. What a trick! He'd have to learn that one himself. "All that . . . just . . . brilliance . . . and then you're only 'clever'! I don't know what kind of spell that was, but I can't even make sparks come out the color I want them!"

Sherlock looked oddly disappointed. "Just average, then. Though I suppose it's nice you didn't tell me to piss off. Usually they tell me to piss off."

John had no idea what that meant, but it sounded like an insult. Even so, he had to know how Sherlock had learned so much so fast and so, wrinkling his forehead against the insult, he asked again, "But how did you _do _that?"

The boy sighed, putting his hands down so that instead of his fingers being propped up in front of his face, they laid gently over top of each other, like he'd been laid out in his coffin, with his head propped up by the back of the seat and his legs dangling out into the space between the seats with almost their full length. "I deduced it, John. It wasn't that hard. For someone paying attention. But no one ever does, do they?"

Now John was sure he was being insulted. He frowned. "I pay attention!"

Sherlock's left eyebrow shot straight up, though at this angle it looked more like it had shot straight backwards. "Do you, now?"

John's hackles raised. "Yes. I do." And now he'd done it. Because now he had to prove it, and there was no way he could do what Sherlock had just done. He still wasn't convinced the other boy hadn't been using magic! But he was going to have a go anyway.

"You're a first year, like me," John said confidently, trying to think through everything he could possibly say to match what Sherlock had figured out. "Your name's Sherlock, and your brother's Mycroft. Wizarding family, obviously, and your older brother's here at school and the Head Boy, so probably your family's got some kind of standing, or else he's "cleverer" than you give him credit for. And I bet you've never ridden a bike in your life."

It wasn't enough, not compared to Sherlock's river of words, so he added a bit more, off the cuff. "Your brother doesn't resent you. Maybe a little. Mostly he worries. He thinks you're antisocial, mostly because you haven't got any friends, but you don't really _want_ friends either, do you? Because you're only talking to me because you want to prove him wrong. You want to prove him wrong about _everything_, don't you? And not just whether you're a Slytherin or a Ravenclaw. Whatever that means. And you're probably going to, too, because you're stubborn. But that's alright. 'Cause I'm stubborn too."

That really _was _all he had, now, and then some, so he tried to force himself to calm down, breathing through his nose. And then Sherlock's face twisted slowly into a massive smile and then the boy sat up straight for the first time, not leaning forward and not leaning backward, and he looked suddenly like an entirely different person.

"Bravo! Above average after all, then! But you're wrong. I _was_ only talking to you to prove Mycroft wrong. _Now_ I'm talking to you because you've turned out to be _interesting_! And that's terribly exciting, you know, because most people aren't interesting. Most people are just dull. And you're only a little dull. Not like the rest of them."

John flushed, angrily. "Well, you're not quite so _interesting_ as you think, you know, because you weren't right, either! I don't know how you knew all that about me, but you only got _most_ of it right, because _I've_ got a sister, and you said _he_. _Harry's_ not a _he_."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You've got a _sister_ called _Harry_. You can't _really_ fault me for mixing that up."

John sniffed, still mad. "It's short for Harriet."

Sherlock ignored the sniff. "But she _does_ resent you?"

John wasn't sure why he was admitting it, but the words came out anyway. "Yes. She does. She says of _course_ I'd be magic, 'cause I've got to beat her in _everything_, but unlike you, I'm not _trying _to do it."

Sherlock settled backward into his seat a little, not slouching magnificently as he'd done before, just leaning, his fingers back to their little peaks in front of his face. "Well, it's not your fault, John. You're special is all."

John leaned back into his own seat, feeling a little more relaxed now that Sherlock was neither studying him like a bug nor sitting straight up and down like he'd been electrocuted. "I'm not that special," he said, blushing.

"You don't _think_ you're that special," Sherlock corrected in a very matter-of-fact tone of voice that made John feel both reassured and irritated at once. "You're very good at guessing, though. Most of what you said was right. Even if you _weren't _deducing it properly. You're clearly good with people. More than good with people. Usually even people who are called 'good with people' still can't handle me and Mycroft. You can. Hence, special."

It would have sounded reasonable, if he didn't still feel like there might be an insult in there somewhere, mixed into the compliments, but he just couldn't parse it out. "Well, I'm not as special as you," John answered finally, "With your whole mind-reading bit."

And then Sherlock laughed for the first time, with a sort of wild abandon, and he began to wonder if it might not be wiser just to leave this compartment. The other boy was fascinating and brilliant and more than a little intriguing, but something about the laughter was wild and uninhibited and maybe a little dangerous. "I _told_ you, John, I didn't do anything but deduce! Your name's on your trunk, but underneath it is another name – Harry Watson – not your father, because the trunk's too new for that, hence sibling. Older, because you don't get hand-me-downs from younger siblings, and not at Hogwarts because then you wouldn't have needed Mycroft to help you with your trunk."

"It's an extra good guess because you're from a muggle family – you did a good job of pretending you weren't, but you also didn't run into _anyone _you knew, friend or foe, and you didn't seem to be looking at the people to _see_ if you might know them. Clearly, you didn't. As for Harry resenting you, it's pretty common in muggle families with wizard children for the ones without magic to resent the ones with it, and you don't buy a new trunk for the kid _not _going to a brand new school, you buy a new trunk for the kid going to the new school. Unless you feel you owe the older one something. She either resents you already or your parents fear she's starting to resent you, so they're placating her."

Sherlock was talking a bit more slowly now, though he was still sprinting along fast enough that John had to listen intently to catch it all. He thought he was following it. How Sherlock had managed to notice and analyze so much so fast, he feared he might never know, but now that he was laying it out, John could almost understand how he'd done it. "It's probably your mother – she's the jumper-knitting type, because that's homemade, but you don't wear it like it's something special, so it's not from your grandmother or some other distant relative and it's not something you got as a gift, it's just something your mother _does_ and so you don't realize, yet, that you're emotionally attached to them, but you probably will. Most kids do. They get homesick and then sentimental."

"And your father doesn't muck about with all those feelings, does he? He's military. It's in the way you hold yourself. Back straight and all that. Still a good father, I should imagine, the way you looked when I brought him up, but military all the same. The bike accident – well, technically that was a guess, but you seem the traditional type, traditional family, fluffy jumper in a conventional school-appropriate color, seemed like it should be a bicycle, and then your face gave it away. You're not a very good liar, are you, John Watson? But we can work on that."

John had _no_ idea what to say to that one, so he just echoed what he'd said earlier. "Brilliant. Yeah. That's right. Nice to know you guessed, though. I guessed."

Sherlock smiled, and there was something odd about it, but it wasn't necessarily a _bad_ kind of odd. "I know, John. S'why you were wrong about my family having status. And I _did _ride a bike once. Bit of an experiment. Turned out badly. Could be right about My', though. I never know what's on in his head, but worry could be it."

John laughed. "Oh, worry is in there. He's trying to find you friends himself in case you don't. That's worry."

Sherlock rolled his eyes expressively. "Or he doesn't want me to be enough of a loner to embarrass him. He could just want you to keep an eye on me and make sure I don't do anything crazy and ruin his image."

John wrinkled his nose. That _did_ sound plausible, but it was awfully cold. Then again, Sherlock was a little cold and both Holmeses were extremely odd, so maybe the older boy really _was_ just thinking of himself. "Well, I hope it's worry, then. Worry's nicer. Means he cares. Though I guess worrying about your effect on his image still means he won't try to pretend you're _not_ his brother, so maybe he cares either way."

Sherlock looked at him as though he'd said something extremely interesting, his eyes narrowing into that same analytical slit for a moment in a way that made John feel slightly uncomfortable.

"So," John said, trying to cut Sherlock off at the pass, "Can you really tell who's going to be sorted into which house? The professor who came to explain it all to me said nobody knew until they got there."

Sherlock grinned devilishly, and if he hadn't already seemed to decide that he and John were friends, John would have been worried by the expression. "Of course I can! I can tell everything about everybody." He came over to the window and they spent the rest of the train ride peering out at the people walking back and forth in the corridor, Sherlock deducing and John memorizing, because he wanted to know if Sherlock would turn out to be right.


	2. Nighttime Wanderings

John began to wonder why he'd decided to be friends with Sherlock on their very first night, before classes had even started. A small voice woke him up in the middle of the night, chirping "John H. Watson? Is you John H. Watson? John H. Watson must come with Hudson, he must, out to where the other boys will not wake up please." Rolling over to look at the owner of the voice, John had nearly shouted out loud. The _thing_ in front of him was tiny and vaguely person-shaped, but with a big head, large pointy ears, and massive eyes that seemed to take up nearly all of her face.

"What?" he whispered back, brain not quite awake yet.

"Mr. Sherlock wants Mr. Watson, says he must talk to Mr. John H. Watson."

John groaned softly, running a hand over his face. The creature was very sweet and very earnest and seemed to have no intention of going away, so he climbed out of bed and followed her into the common room, which was completely deserted this late at night.

"So," he said with a sigh, "Your name is Hudson, right?" The creature nodded, bat ears flapping. "And Sherlock sent you to come get me because he wants to talk to me?" She nodded again.

He thought he probably shouldn't go. The prefect that led the new Gryffindors up to this tower had told them there was a curfew and they weren't allowed outside after hours. And yet . . . he _was _awake already, wasn't he? "Why can't he talk to someone else?" he asked, still trying to decide whether or not he was willing to break the rules for Sherlock. He still felt like he shouldn't, but a big part of him wanted to do it anyway.

The creature looked back and forth as if she feared someone might be listening. "He says they're boring. He says he needs Mr. John H. Watson."

John couldn't say for certain _why_ he was going to go when Sherlock called, but he was suddenly aware that he was going whether it made sense or not. He just couldn't quite _not _go. Not when Sherlock was so interesting and the situation so mysterious. He sighed again. "Where am I supposed to go to meet him, Mrs. Hudson?"

The creature giggled. "Teehee. 'Mrs. Hudson.' Hudson is not married, of course, but still Hudson likes to be called 'Mrs. Hudson,' yes."

John smiled, feeling somewhat better in spite of the late (or perhaps the early) hour. "And you can just call me "John" if you'd like, Mrs. Hudson."

The creature giggled again. "Come along, Mr. John. Mr. Sherlock wants to see you in the Great Hall." John nodded, following behind Mrs. Hudson and realizing outside in the hallway that he should probably have put slippers on first. The rugs in the common room had been comfortable enough, but now that he was out in the castle's corridors, the stone floor was cold enough to make him wince. He almost expected it to be slippery with ice, though really it was just worn smooth by a thousand years of feet walking over it.

He was glad to get to the Great Hall, where he found Sherlock waiting for him at the near end of one of the long benches, turned sideways so that both elbows rested on the table with his long pajama-clad legs stretched into the aisle toward the next table. John joined Sherlock on the bench, facing the other boy and pulling his feet up onto the bench in front of him so that they didn't touch the cold floor anymore.

Mrs. Hudson vanished with a crack that echoed slightly through the room, leaving them alone. Then Sherlock spoke. "John, we need to find the hat. I've been mis-sorted."

John snorted. "Oh come on, Sherlock! I think the hat knew what it was doing. It sounded pretty sure of itself! And anyway, you were right about everyone else, so it seems like the hat did a pretty good job."

Sherlock looked over at him as if he had just said something incredibly stupid, and John almost felt smaller, before he decided that, brilliant as Sherlock was, he was _not _about to let the other boy bully him with his intellect.

"Oh, don't give me that look! It's easier to know other people than it is to know yourself. I mean, I had this friend in primary school who thought he was really dumb, but I kept telling him he wasn't and it turned out he was just bad at reading, but he had the best marks in the class in maths. So he wasn't so dumb after all, he was just dyslexic, and once they diagnosed him he was fine."

As John spoke, Sherlock's spine stiffened from the same relaxed fluidity he'd had on the train to a straight line that made him look more like an action figure stretched into a "relaxed" pose than like someone actually comfortable. "Are you comparing me to a dyslexic boy, John? I'm not dyslexic. I'm not the slightest bit dyslexic. Or anything else, in fact. I'm completely normal. My mother had me tested."

John snorted again. He probably should be more patient, he supposed, but Sherlock had already dragged him out of bed in the middle of the night, and the cold of the castle, now that he was away from the Gryffindor common room's warm fire and the comfort of his own bed, was making his almost-healed shoulder sprain ache again. "Oh come on, Sherlock! That's not what I meant and you know it! And anyway, there's nothing wrong with having dyslexia. He couldn't help it."

Sherlock's face relaxed, a wrinkle between his eyes disappearing, but his body didn't. Instead, he shoved against the table, springing upright, and turned toward John again with his open dressing gown flapping behind him, the navy blue silk light enough to almost float. "Well, either way, I've got to talk to the hat. I was right about everyone else, and I _ought_ to have been right about _me_. And anyway, I don't _want_ to be in Slytherin with Mycroft. I want to be in _Ravenclaw_, and I told it that, but it didn't listen. Probably felt pressured by the need to make a quick decision and get on to the rest of you. I'm sure I can convince it now."

John couldn't help wondering if Sherlock might have a point about time. His own sorting had been fairly quick, perhaps a minute, and some kids had been sorted almost before the hat touched their heads. Anderson, an obnoxious boy they'd met on the boat ride to the castle, had sorted into Slytherin with Sherlock in what was probably the fastest sorting of the night. Not that it had come as much of a surprise. Sherlock hadn't said what house he thought the boy would be in before the sorting, but if John had guessed, he'd have guessed Slytherin himself.

As they came into sight of Hogwarts for the first time, Anderson had pretended to be unaffected and unimpressed by the sight of Hogwarts even as the rest of them - including Sherlock - gawked at the castle, and he'd gone on and on about how _obviously_ it would be big, and _proper_wizards should know how to handle it. He'd said he was sure _he_ could cope with a big building like that and he was sure he'd figure it out in a week or less and could help his boatmates if they got lost. It had clearly rubbed Sherlock the wrong way, and John half wondered if Anderson's presence in Slytherin didn't have something to do with Sherlock's desperate desire to re-sort, just as much as Mycroft being in his house did.

Sherlock had sat on the stool for almost 10 whole minutes before the hat made its decision, and now John wondered if it was because he and the hat had been arguing. And then the hat had declared "Slytherin," and Sherlock had made a face that looked like he might kill someone before he handed the hat back to the professor and went over to his table. Mycroft had left an empty seat beside him and had insisted that Sherlock sit in it. From the line of first-years still waiting to be sorted, John had been able to see Sherlock glaring at his brother and then settling in to pout dramatically. Perhaps he should have expected this. Sherlock didn't seem the type to take things lying down, even if they _weren't_ supposed to be running around the castle in the middle of the night after the sorting hat.

John stood up with a sigh, wincing as his bare feet hit the cold floor again. "So where _is_ the hat, anyway?"

Sherlock turned away, staring out through the Great Hall's door and into the dim corridors. "I'm not sure. Either McGonagall's office or Dumbledore's, but McGonagall's will be easier to get into. That's where we're going tonight. My plan to get us into the headmaster's office is going to take a bit longer. But it _could_ still be with Professor McGonagall if we're lucky."

John snorted. "Right. Lucky. Best way to make a plan, hope you're lucky." He wasn't sure why he said it. He was coming along anyway.

Sherlock seemed to know that, because he ignored the comment, fishing a pair of socks out of his dressing gown pocket and handing them to John. "Oh yes. And I brought you these." John wasn't sure how Sherlock had known he would forget his slippers, but he didn't ask, because he was grateful for the socks. They were the thin black kind that went with dress clothes and were somehow always both too hot and too cold at once, and they didn't help as much as his own socks (the kind of thick, white, cotton ones usually bought in packages of nine) would have. They were still better than nothing, even if the fine material did feel a bit odd with his too-big red flannel pajamas over them.

Sherlock's own feet were protected by fine plush slippers in a dark blue that exactly matched the shade of his almost tailored-looking silk pajamas and the open dressing gown over them, and John wondered if Sherlock might actually not _own _clothing that looked like something normal people wore, rather than like something that belonged on the sort of formal, suited models found in magazines. His daytime robes looked nicer than John's, too.

Sherlock started walking almost before John had the socks on all the way, and he had to scramble to catch up. Luckily, (or perhaps unluckily) it turned out that Sherlock had been slowing down for him. As soon as he caught up, Sherlock walked faster, his dressing gown swirling a little around his long legs as he hurried forward. John half jogged beside him, feeling ridiculous, because between his shorter legs and his overlarge pajamas, he knew he didn't have the sort of presence that Sherlock did, hurtling casually around corners.

Sherlock's eyes occasionally flicked toward the pictures on the walls, as if he were looking for something, but John wasn't sure what exactly it was that his new friend was looking for, because the people in most of the portraits seemed to be asleep. He focused his energies on keeping up with Sherlock, putting the rest out of mind. He wasn't sure why he trusted the other boy not to get them caught out of bed after hours on their first night, which probably wouldn't be the best way to start their first year here, but he trusted him all the same.

When Sherlock pulled him into an abandoned classroom to wait out the patrolling teacher in the corridor, John wasn't sure how he'd known to do it, but he decided it didn't matter. They had to get to McGonagall's office and Sherlock had to talk to the hat and that was just the way it was.

When they finally reached the office, John realized that it was quite close to his own common room and half wondered for a moment why Sherlock had made him go all the way down to the Great Hall and back if their destination was right here all along. But then he realized that you could never quite figure why Sherlock did _anything_, at least not when you'd only known him for a few hours, so he might as well decide that he didn't mind.

Sherlock pulled his wand out of his pocket, a long thin thing made of vine wood, and whispered a spell at the door so quietly that John couldn't make out the syllables, and the lock on the door clicked open. Sherlock waved John inside, making it clear from his hand motions that John was meant to start looking on the right side of the doorway while he himself looked on the left, and making it clear from his manner that they had to be quiet about it. John could make out the very faint sound of wheezy breathing coming from the next room, and blushed deeply. Professor McGonagall was asleep in the very next room! And here they were plundering her office in the middle of the night!

But as awful as it was, it was also terribly exciting, so he stepped carefully into the room behind Sherlock, tiptoeing around the side to look for the hat. If it was here, it wasn't out in the open, or at least, not obviously. The room was neat, with everything in its proper place, and looking didn't take much time, especially because the bookshelves that lined John's wall were very narrow, with some of the largest books sticking out the front of the shelf because it wasn't deep enough to hold them properly. Sherlock's side held a row of cabinets, whose doors he opened and closed very, very quietly as John moved quickly along the shelves on his own side.

Once he finished the right-hand wall, he started looking through the glass cabinets that were behind the professor's desk, filled with odds and ends on display. He would have expected the sort of little plaster figurines his grandmother kept on her mantel, but instead he found a familiar-looking framed letter, just like the one he himself had gotten when he was invited to come here, a small trophy proclaiming McGonagall the "Outstanding NEWT Student of the Year – Transfiguration," and a small black box holding a plain gold ring, among other odds-and-ends of what was clearly her actual life.

Somehow it made him feel even worse about snooping than the figurines would have. McGonagall wasn't just some poor innocent old lady they were snooping on – she was a poor innocent old lady who apparently cared an awful lot about her school and who probably would be upset that they were trying to reconsult the hat at all, even if they _hadn't _been snooping in her office to do it.

Sherlock turned away from the last cabinet, looking disappointed, and pointed at the desk, which was in the middle of the room and had two chairs in front of it and one behind. John shook his head. He hadn't gotten there yet. But it had only three drawers, and the top of it was neat and clearly hatless, and it didn't take long for Sherlock to rummage through it before he was waving John out the door again.

Outside in the corridor, Sherlock led John effortlessly, and still at the same breakneck pace, to a flight of stairs, which he climbed about halfway up before stopping abruptly and sitting down with a speed that made his dressing gown billow up around him and then land on the stairs like a train behind his back. John slid down more slowly to sit on the steps beside him, leaning against the railing. "So now what?" he asked.

Sherlock sighed deeply. "Now, we wait. There's no more to be done tonight. Well. I'm sure it won't be too late even if I _have_ been a Slytherin for a few days before I can get to the hat. Dumbledore will be able to fix it. Don't you think?"

The question surprised John, because it was easy, once Sherlock got going, to forget that as brilliant as he was, he was still 11 years old, just like the rest of them. "Of course," he said, patting the other boy on the knee in an attempt to reassure him. "They can't stick you there forever if the hat says it's wrong, can they?"

Sherlock looked analytically at him again, his eyes going hard and piercing for just a moment. "You don't really believe that, though."

John wasn't sure what to say, so he moved his hand away from Sherlock's knee and looked out over the edge of the railing for a moment, at the corridor below them. "I don't really think you'll change its mind. It doesn't seem like the sort of thing you _can _change the mind of. But anyway, I'm only a muggle-born, so what do I know about it? Maybe you can. If anyone can, it's probably you."

Sherlock nodded, relaxing in that pecuiliar but already-familiar way he had of suddenly appearing not to have any bones. "Perhaps you're right, John."

For a few moments, they sat there in silence, disappointment radiating from Sherlock so intensely that John thought he could almost feel it against his skin. John wasn't sure why they were sitting here instead of moving, and he wasn't sure why he himself let them continue sitting here when they probably both ought, by rights, to be going back to bed. But he had a sense that Sherlock sort of needed to sit here and that he needed John to sit here too, and even though it didn't make any sense, it felt like it was true. And anyway, Sherlock wasn't bad company, even if he _was _a bit odd. The silence wasn't terribly uncomfortable, and it was nice to be able to think his own thoughts for a while, in peace.

He wondered how Sherlock was going to get them into and out of the headmaster's office without being caught. He didn't even know where the headmaster's office was. But Sherlock obviously did, and whatever the plan was would probably work, and . . . and . . . a huge yawn split John's face and Sherlock turned inquisitively toward him, almost as if he didn't know what it was.

John yawned a second time almost immediately, but this time he tried to stop it. He'd been sitting still for long enough that the adrenaline of the thing was wearing off and the thrill of being outside his common room after hours had given way to renewed aching in his shoulder and a sudden vague desperation about how many stairs were between him and the top of the tower.

He yawned a third time, and it occurred to him that it shouldn't even be possible to yawn so many times in so few minutes. So much for sitting and thinking.

He hauled himself to his feet. "We ought to be getting to bed. We've got school in the morning. New classes and all."

Sherlock looked up at him with mournful eyes that John suddenly noticed were picking the blue in his pajamas instead of keeping their usual grey, like even they wanted him to be resorted to Ravenclaw. "Have we really got to?"

John might have laughed at Sherlock's hangdog expression if he weren't so tired. "Of course we have! You can't just not sleep."

Sherlock's eyebrows drew closer together. "_I_ can. Sleeping's boring."

John grinned wryly. "And sitting here not talking isn't?"

Sherlock thought for a moment. "Sitting here not talking is at least something new," he declared, rising to his feet as if feeling a bit put out by the fact that he was doing it. "At least the way you and I do it, it is. When Mycroft and I sit down and don't talk it's completely different."

John supposed that was probably true. Not talking to Sherlock wasn't quite like not talking to other people. He didn't feel like he _ought _to be talking, not like he usually did. "Well, there's that. But we've still got to sleep."

Sherlock sighed. "All right, then. Your common room's up these stairs, then the next flight, but then you have to make a jog to the right and take the next set of stairs over the rest of the way up."

Sherlock himself started climbing downward, and John reached out to stop him. "How'd you know where my common room was?"

Sherlock pulled his arm out of John's grip, not quite looking at him. "I asked Hudson, of course, how'd you think?"

John nodded. "Right. Hudson. I called her Mrs. Hudson by accident, seemed polite or something, I guess, but I think she liked it, anyway."

Sherlock seemed to be thinking that out for a moment and then he nodded. "Mrs. Hudson. I like it. I think I'll use it too." Then he was gone, bounding down the steps twice as fast as he had before and quickly vanishing out of sight around a corner in the corridor below.

John climbed much more slowly up to his own room, told the vaguely disapproving fat lady in the portrait his password, and went to bed, where he almost couldn't sleep because he'd started wondering again how in the world Sherlock was going to get them into the headmaster's office. Because there was no doubt that he _would_. The question was, how? Or perhaps - When? Either way, it took John what felt like ages to nod off, and even then he had confusing dreams about following Sherlock's billowy dressing gown down winding passages, around and around and around, until he realized they were going in circles and woke up to the first rays of sunlight streaming in through the windows.


	3. A Study in Sorting

John didn't speak to Sherlock again until their Potions class, late the following afternoon. At breakfast and lunch they'd been separated by the width of the Great Hall, with the other houses in between them and John had been pulled away from looking for Sherlock by the attentions of his fellow Gryffindors. One of his roommates had woken briefly when John got back last night and had seen him crawling back into bed, and now the other first years all wanted to know where he'd gone and why and how he hadn't been caught. He didn't want to tell them any of it, so he kept changing the subject, something much easier to do once they'd gotten their schedules and could talk about their classes instead.

Sally Donovan proved the hardest to shake, because she seemed to care an awful lot about the rules and kept asking him why in the _world_ he would start breaking them before they'd even properly started school. He'd been trying to avoid her since breakfast, but it was easier said than done – all of the first years were nervous, shy, and easily lost, so they'd been sticking together like glue. John didn't want to leave the _whole_ group. He just didn't want to be near Sally.

The Potions teacher, Professor Snape, had apparently either a wonderful or a terrible ability to sense these sorts of things, because he immediately paired John with Sally to share a cauldron, a match only beaten out in awkwardness by the fact that he'd also paired Sherlock with Anderson, the obnoxious boy from the boat ride yesterday. John watched worriedly as Sherlock walked over to Anderson's cauldron, but then his friend turned, when no one else was looking, and winked. John made a point of not watching anymore, because this was clearly going to be trouble.

Sure enough, after about five minutes, Anderson was shouting at Sherlock while his cauldron melted across the floor, and Sherlock was very calmly insisting that it wasn't his fault at all that Anderson couldn't follow directions, when he'd _told _him not to add the beetle eyes yet. After eight minutes the entire mess was cleaned up and John had volunteered to be Sherlock's partner instead, leaving Anderson to work at Sally's cauldron while he and Sherlock hastily set up John's own cauldron to start the potion over again.

"Bravo, John!" Sherlock whispered, "You sounded completely innocent."

John snickered. "I know. So did you!"

With the professor's beady black eyes on Sherlock, they settled down to work, trying to catch up with the rest of the class, and they almost didn't talk, keeping away from every subject but the potion in front of them. Sherlock kept an eye on Professor Snape, though, and the moment he left his desk to look at someone else's potion, he bent over to whisper in John's ear.

"Ten minutes into dinner tonight, excuse yourself to go to the toilet and I'll meet you outside in front of the stairs to the third floor."

Then he straightened up and went back to work as if he hadn't said anything at all and John couldn't help marvelling at how innocent his face looked. He was worried that his own face might show that they were plotting something and hoped that Professor Snape was still paying more attention to Sherlock than he was to him.

On the way to dinner from Potions, Sherlock melted away from John's side just in time for the other Gryffindors to crowd around him, asking why he'd volunteered to work with a _Slytherin _and wasn't that Holmes boy awfully strange and what had he been like, anyway. John didn't want to talk about that any more than he'd wanted to talk about where he'd been last night.

Eventually, he managed to get a word in edgewise and shut the conversation down. "I just figured someone ought to or they'd never stop fighting, so why not? It was only for today, anyway."

The first bit was a lie – he'd done it because he wanted to work with Sherlock and because he'd known Sherlock meant him to suggest it – and the second bit _felt_ like a lie because he was actually wishing he could stay partnered with Sherlock, especially if the alternative was Sally. He just hoped that eventually the other Gryffindors would accept the idea that John was friends with Sherlock, if this continued, instead of being like this about it all the time.

Maybe it would be easier if Sherlock got resorted into Ravenclaw. Somehow it seemed impossible, already, to stop being friends with Sherlock. He had a sense that even if he tried, he'd find himself drawn into Sherlock's intrigues. Sherlock seemed to want him to be involved in things like sneaking around after dark, and John had a feeling that what Sherlock wanted, he usually got.

By the time they were ten minutes into dinner, only Sally had persisted in asking him questions about Sherlock, constantly adding "that kid Anderson told me" with some kind of strange accusation after it. Apparently, Anderson and Sherlock had known each other growing up, or at least Anderson had heard of Sherlock growing up. Or perhaps he had simply decided he hated Sherlock just as quickly as Sherlock had decided he hated Anderson, and he'd started making things up. Most of the stories didn't even make sense. Why in the world would Sherlock have a jar of eyeballs buried in his backyard? And where would he have gotten a jar of eyeballs, anyway?

Excusing himself for the bathroom was a relief, if just because out in the corridor there were no more bizarre accusations about Sherlock. He wasn't sure why they bothered him so much – it wasn't like he and Sherlock had been friends for long, anyway – but they did. Hurrying to the stairs, he tried to forget all the things Sally had repeated from Anderson, deciding that he, too, hated the other boy already. He wasn't quite ready to hate Sally herself yet. She seemed to mean well, anyway. Or something. There was nothing _technically_ wrong with thinking he should follow the rules or with worrying that one of her new housemates might be making friends with someone bad. It was just the way she _did _it that was annoying.

Just a few minutes after he got to the bottom of the staircase, Sherlock came running up, uniform robes flapping behind him as he raced toward John at full speed.

"Hurry!" he exclaimed, "That won't hold him there for long! The old man eats _really_ fast!"

Sherlock took the stairs three at a time, but John could only manage two at a time and even that was a bit of a stretch. He fell behind quickly. For a moment, he wondered what, exactly, Sherlock had done to keep Dumbledore down in the Great Hall, but then he focused on trying to catch up instead. His friend waited at the top of the stairs, tapping his foot impatiently, and John frowned at him.

"Oh stop that," John said, half gasping from exhertion, "My legs aren't as long as yours."

Sherlock said nothing, but as soon as John could (mostly) breathe, he took off running so that John had to push himself to keep up all over again. A few turns later, he came to an abrupt halt in front of a gargoyle in the corridor, stopping so quickly that John almost ran straight past him.

Sherlock thought for a moment, then declared, "Mars Bars," and the gargoyle sprang aside to reveal a spiral staircase that Sherlock took without hesitation, this time only two steps at a time because of the steepness of the curve. John took them one at a time, watching nervously behind them because it seemed like getting in here had been too easy.

Finding the hat was equally easy – it was sitting out in plain sight behind Professor Dumbledore's desk and when John entered the room, Sherlock was already halfway to it. John stood by the doorway to stand guard while his friend approached the hat, picked it up, and placed it on his head.

Then he started arguing with it out loud, and John half wondered what the other half of the conversation was.

"_Of course_ I'm unhappy with my sorting! I told you I was a Ravenclaw, and you put me in Slytherin!"

John had a feeling that the hat wouldn't take that comment well, and he seemed to be right – Sherlock's face clouded over angrily.

"No, I _don't_ think I was wrong. I wasn't wrong about anyone _else_!" and then, "Of _course_ I understand myself! It's everyone _else_ that doesn't. And anyway, who would understand me better than me? I _am_ me!"

John thought for a moment that the last comment might be the least elegant sentence he'd ever heard Sherlock utter, but his friend was soon back to telling the hat off and he turned back to the stairs to watch for intruders.

"Of course I'm not ambitious. Mycroft's ambitious, not me - what do you mean 'different ambitions'? 'Ambition' seems like a perfectly straightforward noun to me."

Then came a series of protestations that left John with no way at all to reconstruct what the hat had said.

"I hardly think – I do not!" "That doesn't even make. . ." "But how can I-?" And then finally, he cried, outraged, "The _solar system?_ I don't even _need _the solar system!"

The light sound of footsteps echoed up the stairwell from the corridor outside and John turned to his friend.

"Sherlock, shut up! Someone's down there!"

Sherlock's mouth snapped shut, but he was clearly still arguing with the hat, his eyes screwed tightly shut as if he were trying to think very loudly at it. A vaguely familiar voice came echoing up the stairs, the words "mars bars" making John's blood run cold.

"Hide!" he whispered, as a light at the bottom of the stairs proved the gargoyle had stepped out of the way, "Quick, he's coming."

Sherlock didn't seem to hear him, so John rushed across the room and grabbed the other boy's arm, dragging him quickly behind a small table in the corner and squatting down so that the tablecloth hid them. A grinding sound came from the stairway instead of footsteps, but John had no doubt that it was Dumbledore coming toward them. He peeked for a moment over the table top, but Sherlock seemed to have gotten ahold of his faculties again and tugged him back down out of sight before he could see anything but the top of the headmaster's head, rising up as the staircase moved beneath him.

John wished Sherlock weren't still wearing the hat – what if the headmaster noticed it was gone? But it was too late now, so he just closed his eyes and focused on his breathing, trying to make it as quiet as possible. Beside him, Sherlock did the same, his fingers still locked tightly onto John's forearm where he'd grabbed him to keep him out of sight. They listened intently as Dumbledore sat down in his chair with the sort of vague grunting sigh of an old man, shrinking toward the wall together to stay farther out of his line of sight.

The headmaster sighed again, this time intentionally.

"Please come out here, Mr. Holmes."

John's eyes widened and he looked at Sherlock, but his friend shook his head slightly and they both stayed put. Dumbledore sighed again a third time and the table floated away from its spot on the floor in front of them, revealing John and Sherlock huddled together, the hat still propped silently on top of Sherlock's head. Dumbledore waved toward the two chairs in front of his desk.

"Do have a seat, boys."

This time, John moved without looking at Sherlock first, pulling his arm out of the other boy's grip as a blush spread itself across his cheeks. He couldn't quite seem to meet the headmaster's eyes.

"I'm sorry, sir," he said quietly, sliding into his seat. He couldn't believe he was in trouble on his very first day! But then, Sherlock was walking grudgingly toward the chair beside him, so perhaps he could.

Beside him, Sherlock plopped gracelessly into the other chair, apparently still irritated at the whole situation, and announced "I'm not sorry. Your sorting hat has made a mistake, and I'm here to correct it." He was sitting perfectly upright, with his back straight and the hat still on his head, chin up as confidently as if the hat was his own and he was accustomed to wearing it.

The hat opened its slit of a mouth and announced. "I have _not_ made a mistake. I do not make mistakes. Nor do I change my mind, though this young fellow seems to think he can force me to through the strength of his convictions. The fact remains that he belongs in Slytherin."

Dumbledore leaned back slightly in his seat and steepled his fingers in front of his face to study Sherlock, and for a moment, John was reminded intensely of Sherlock himself, the way he'd been on the train, though Dumbledore's slight lean was nowhere near as dramatic as Sherlock's spineless reclining had been.

After a moment, Dumbledore said softly, "Yes, I'm afraid you _are_ a Slytherin, I think, Mr. Holmes. The hat is never wrong."

Something about the way the old man's eyes twinkled behind his glasses at the end made John wonder if the hat _was_ actually wrong on occasion and Dumbledore just didn't want to tell _Sherlock_ that.

Sherlock spluttered. "No, but . . . but I'm a Ravenclaw! I've _always_ thought I was a Ravenclaw, and Mycroft always said Slytherin, but he _can't _be right."

Dumbledore smiled gently. "Sherlock, I think you're a different _kind_ of Slytherin than Mycroft is. And there's nothing wrong with that. Your house does not have to define you. You define your house, and I think you'll define Slytherin rather well. It is a mistake to think of each house as only one thing, because nobody is only one thing. You're going to be alright, Sherlock. You can be a Slytherin without being Mycroft. It's probably better if you do. Be yourself, and the rest will come along alright."

Sherlock's forehead wrinkled as though he was about to say something, perhaps thinking that Dumbledore was soft, but John could tell that there was something firm under the gentle platitudes and reassurances, so he put his hand on Sherlock's arm to stop him from speaking.

"Sir, do you really think he'll be ok there? What if he gets along better with the people in Ravenclaw? I mean, if he _thinks_ he fits there, couldn't that mean he has an easier time getting along with the people who fit there because they _also _think of themselves as the kind of people who fit there?"

Dumbledore turned his sparkling blue eyes on John and he felt himself begin to blush again, though this time he forced himself to meet the headmaster's eyes.

"Very astute, Mr. Watson. But I don't think he would get along so well with the Ravenclaws as he will the Slytherins, regardless of what he thinks – the hat _does_ know what it's doing, you know." The old man's eyes were twinkling again. "And he's got you, hasn't he, John? I think he'll be alright."

John felt proud of himself for just an instant, until Dumbledore kept talking.

"Of course, you might want to make _some _attempt to keep him out of other people's offices in the future. Not everyone is as understanding as I am. Professor McGonagall, for example, would likely be highly disappointed in you."

John felt his stomach twisting uncomfortably. How had the headmaster found out about that? And why wasn't he yelling at them? Dumbledore rose to his feet with another faint old-man sort of groan, and John stood up to mirror him, because the conversation was clearly over, and if that meant they weren't getting in trouble, John could live with that. Sherlock sulked in his chair, because he could see just as well as John could that he'd lost the argument.

"Now, may I please have my hat back, Mr. Holmes?" Dumbledore prompted gently.

Sherlock folded his arms over his chest. "Fine. Take it. It's not like it listens to me anyway."

John lifted the hat carefully off of Sherlock's head and placed it lightly on the desk, because Sherlock was clearly not going to do it himself, then hauled his friend out of the chair and to his feet, leading him toward the door. Sherlock followed along, but he was far from happy about it.

"It's almost the end of dinner," Dumbledore observed, "but if you hurry, there might still be time for dessert. If no one's thrown it about."

The way he glanced at Sherlock as he said it made John feel almost completely certain that a food fight had been Sherlock's diversion of choice to keep the headmaster down at dinner instead of up at his office.

John nodded, because Sherlock was still hunched over, sulking and ignoring the headmaster completely. "Thanks. And thanks for not getting us in trouble."

Dumbledore smiled. "Don't let it happen again, John. And _do_ reassure him that you can like him even if he's in Slytherin, because he's not sure Gryffindors can." John nodded again, shutting Dumbledore's office door behind them and leading Sherlock onto the stairs, which began rotating helpfully downward as soon as they stepped onto them so that he didn't have to get Sherlock to climb down them himself.

"That's ridiculous," Sherlock muttered as soon as the door closed. "I do _not _think Gryffindors and Slytherins aren't allowed to like each other."

John didn't have to puzzle through the double negative to know what to say. "Come on, Sherlock. Let's go get dessert. At least being friends with you only screwed up the _boring_ parts of dinner."

Down in the Great Hall, there was no one left except for a team of house elves cleaning the plates. John led Sherlock, who was still trailing sulkily along beside him and following John's grip on his arm, to the Gryffindor table, because there wasn't anyone left to care and it seemed easiest.

Then he looked around the room, spotted Mrs. Hudson, and walked over to her, leaving Sherlock to sulk for a moment. "Mrs. Hudson, it seems we've missed dinner. Would you mind terribly bringing Sherlock and I something to eat? Or maybe even just some dessert? Whatever's easiest for you, of course."

She giggled. "Calling Hudson 'Mrs. Hudson' again, yes? Mrs. Hudson likes that." Then her face took on a more serious expression. "Mrs. Hudson is not Mr. Watson's _personal _house elf, of course."

John didn't know what that meant, but he knew well enough to agree. "No, of course not. I just thought maybe if I asked nicely you might be willing to do us a favor this once."

Mrs. Hudson studied him for a moment before her oddly-shaped face burst into a huge grin. "For Mr. Watson, Mrs. Hudson will do a favor. Dinner will be right here very soon."

John grinned back. "Thanks, Mrs. H. You're the best." The house elf giggled at the new nickname just as delightedly as she had at the first and then vanished with an abrupt pop.

John went back to Sherlock. "Mrs. Hudson's bringing us dinner. And dessert too, I think."

Sherlock nodded, but he didn't seem to be listening. He'd lost the upright bearing and now his crossed arms rested on the table, his chin propped over the middle of his forearms. His spine was doing that melty thing again, a bit, though it was harder to tell because he was hunched so tightly inward on himself.

After just a moment, he spoke. "The solar system," he said, with no explanation of what he meant by it, "This whole bloody thing's about the stupid _solar system_."

John sat down beside him. "What about the solar system?"

Sherlock turned his head to the side to look up at John. "I deleted it."

John's eyebrows wrinkled. "Deleted it?"

Sherlock nodded again, head still turned sideways. "I don't keep things in my brain if I don't need them. I only keep the useful things. The solar system's not _useful_. But the hat says that's not Ravenclawy of me at all. It says _all_ Ravenclaws would remember the solar system, just because it's _interesting_."

John bit his lip. "I mean, it _is_ interesting, though, isn't it? Trips to the planetarium and all that? You must know _something _about the solar system."

Sherlock shook his head. "Nothing. Why should I? I'm never going to use it. I mean, really, what's knowing the solar system good for?"

John almost mentioned the fact that at least _his_ schedule had Astronomy listed on it as one of their classes. "I don't know. It's just one of those things you're supposed to know, isn't it? Everybody knows the solar system."

Sherlock turned his face away again, straightening his head up to look in front of him. "I don't. And anyway, I don't see the point. It's not like I'm going to be an astronaut. I'm going to be a wizard. I'm never going to _need_ the solar system." And in an odd way, he was right, so John let the conversation settle into silence.

It wasn't until Mrs. Hudson brought them two plates of food and they'd started to tuck in that he spoke again. "You really know nothing about the solar system?"

Sherlock looked up from where he'd been picking at his food. "I really know nothing about the solar system."

John tried not to laugh. It had just occurred to him to find it funny – the boy who seemed to know everything about everything didn't know the basic astronomy he himself had learned in primary school. But Sherlock looked too sad to make fun of right now, as he pushed his plate of roast beef and mashed potatoes away and dragged his small plate of chocolate cake forward in its place.

"Well, you can relearn it, anyway," John said instead.

Sherlock looked mournfully down at his cake, stabbing it morosely. "What's the point? It's too late now, anyway. I'm in stupid _Slytherin_, like Mycroft, and I'm never getting out."

John wasn't sure what to say to that either. "You'll be alright," he said finally. "Just eat your cake." Sherlock did.


	4. The Shrieking Shack

**Chapter revised with help from the lovely Persevera. Thanks for the insightful review!**

* * *

"Bored."

John gritted his teeth, trying not to snap at Sherlock. The other boy had been repeating the same word at three-minute intervals for the last half an hour, while simultaneously blowing holes in the hangings over John's bed. It had taken Sherlock four days to break into the Gryffindor common room, but John got the feeling that it was only because the other boy had been trying not to. He didn't imagine the password was actually much of a challenge.

All John knew for sure was that two weeks ago, Sherlock had suddenly appeared in front of the chair he was sitting in and announced that he was doing an experiment and needed John's help. He'd agreed, if only to get Sherlock out of the tower and stop the rest of his house from glaring at them, but Sherlock seemed to have taken the fact that John hadn't yelled at him or told him explicitly to get out as some sort of unspoken agreement between them that Sherlock could poke his nose into John's business whenever he felt like it.

Now Sherlock spent as much time in John's dorm as he did in his own, maybe more, and while most of the other Gryffindors didn't like it, they also didn't say anything anymore, so long as it was obvious that the Slytherin was only passing through their common room to find John and had no intention of actually staying there.

Sherlock had transfigured John's slightly battered trunk into a slightly-more-battered desk, with lots of drawers that fit all of his clothes and things even though he didn't think they should. Then he'd helped John lug one of the smaller, less comfortable chairs, the one least likely to be missed, out of the common room and up the stairs. Sherlock was fully aware that John's dorm room was somewhat less off-limits than the common room, though he didn't really seem to grasp that it was because that way the rest of the Gryffindors could pretend he wasn't there.

John supposed he was just lucky that Sherlock had deigned to set him up a place at all rather than just taking over the bed and leaving John to sit on the floor. He didn't much feel like adding "Budge over, it's my bed anyway," to the list of arguments they had all the time, not when he spent so much time already saying things like, "Really, Sherlock, you've _got_ to eat something," and "No, I _won't_ do your homework for you, you're perfectly capable of doing it yourself," and "I don't _care_ if you can make it look like an accident, you still can't blow up Anderson." Part of being friends with Sherlock was keeping him on track and not putting up with his crap, but at some point enough was enough. John had to pick his battles, and it was nice to have one less thing to fight about.

Now John was sitting in the chair, at the desk, working away while Sherlock sprawled across his bed like he owned it, blew holes in the furniture and kept the rest of the first-year Gryffindors John shared the room with away from them, just by existing. John wasn't quite sure why he put up with it. Maybe it was because he knew Sherlock didn't have anyone else. Maybe it was because the other boy was so exciting and fun when he wasn't being frustrating like this that it balanced out. Maybe it was because he knew trying to stop Sherlock doing whatever he wanted was going to be futile anyway, even if he _was_ better at corralling his best friend than anyone else seemed to be. He sighed.

With a bang, Sherlock blasted another hole in the curtain over the bed. "Bored."

This time, John couldn't stop the words before they came out. "You know, you _could_ work on our Potions homework like you're _supposed_ to."

Sherlock rolled over onto his side to stare at John for a moment. "And that's supposed to make me _less_ bored, John? I could do it in my sleep!"

John rolled his eyes. "And yet somehow, you never do. . . Anyway, it can't be any worse that just _lying_ there."

Sherlock looked thoughtful, then rolled the rest of the way over so that he was right-side-up. "You're right. We've got to get out of here. Just let me think for a minute." John groaned. Whatever Sherlock came up with was likely to take hours and leave him to finish his homework in the middle of the night, while everyone else was asleep, like he'd been doing for basically the entire time they'd been at school. At some point, he should probably put his foot down. Except he didn't _actually_ want to do his homework any more than Sherlock did, so as soon as the opportunity to go off on his friend's latest wild goose chase appeared, he was sure he would jump at it.

He sighed again and wrote faster, trying to copy out the rest of the passage on dittany before Sherlock dragged him away in the middle of a question. That was always the worst, because he'd spend half of their adventure thinking about the things he'd left half-finished, but when he got back he'd have lost his train of thought anyway. Just as John was dotting his last "i", Sherlock sat bolt upright, as if he'd been electrocuted. "Of course! How could I not think of it earlier?"

John sighed, putting his quill down and capping his bottle of ink. "Think of what?"

Sherlock leapt off of John's bed and grabbed him by the wrist, dragging him along toward the doorway. "Come on! We're going to do something no one's ever been able to do before!"

John trailed along behind Sherlock, hurrying to keep up as the taller boy half-leapt down the stairs into the common room. He was beginning to get used to the feeling of his friend's wiry fingers wrapped around his wrist and dragging him along. But at least they weren't actually holding hands. That could get a bit embarrassing, and Sherlock was sure not to notice the awkwardness. He seemed immune to what other people thought about him, which John sometimes hated and sometimes just envied. "What's that?" John asked.

Sherlock glanced around them at the people in the common room, who were glaring in their general direction as usual, made a face at Sally, who he had come to hate almost as much as he did Anderson, and answered, "You'll see."

Once they were outside, Sherlock kept going, dragging John along without a word, and John put up with it even though the things Sherlock was most tight-lipped about were almost always the most dangerous, frustrating, messy, and ridiculous. Or maybe he put up with it _because_ the things Sherlock was most tight-lipped about were almost always the most dangerous, frustrating, messy, and ridiculous. They were also, inevitably, the most fun.

Sherlock didn't slow down until they were all the way outside, looking around for a moment – just long enough for John to extricate his wrist from Sherlock's viselike grip – and taking off again, almost sprinting across the grounds with John barely keeping up beside him. Then he stopped abruptly in front of a tree, which sat in the middle of a small clearing of its own.

John wasn't ready for the halt and kept running, only to find that the tree attacked anyone who came under its branches. Just as he was about to be flattened by a particularly large branch, Sherlock grabbed the back of his robes and pulled him out of the way. "Don't get too close," he said calmly. "This is a Whomping Willow."

John couldn't help glaring a little. "You could have warned me, you know."

Sherlock looked not-quite-ashamed. "Maybe. I was excited."

It was as much of an apology as John was likely to get. He sighed, and moved on. "Ok, so why are you excited?"

Sherlock looked at him, puzzled. "Well, isn't it obvious? There's something under it. It's guarding something."

John rolled his eyes. Obvious. Right. "And this meant we had to run _because_?"

Sherlock turned toward John and grinned, a slightly insane glint to his eyes. "Because _I_ don't know what it is."

John raised an eyebrow. "You can't even guess?"

Sherlock grinned. "I can't even guess. Not enough data. Isn't that exciting! I love a mystery. . ." He started walking around the tree in a circle, staying carefully outside the reach of its branches. "But how do we _get_ under it?"

John glanced back at the castle. Now that this had turned out to be less immediately exciting than it might have been, he wished that he'd had time to bring his homework with him. For some reason, Sherlock insisted that John stay near him when he was thinking, even if that meant John had to watch him walking in circles for hours. If John left anyway, which he did sometimes when something seemed important enough, Sherlock was sure to go all pouty and boring for the rest of the day.

Maybe he could find some kind of spell that would materialize his homework in front of him wherever he was. Maybe it was depressing that he was daydreaming about homework-materializing spells. It seemed a little pathetic. Maybe he'd better focus on the matter at hand and worry about his homework later.

John started walking around the tree, too, in the opposite direction from Sherlock so that they passed each other once on each side. Sherlock said nothing, staring at the branches like they were jigsaw pieces he was trying to put together. After a few minutes, he started running under the branches and then back out again, as if trying to gauge the tree's reaction time. John had already almost been hit by one of the branches and he stayed well out of its reach, staring at the trunk as he got more comfortable with the size of his circle. Then he noticed it – a small hole at the base of the trunk, like the entrance to a tunnel.

"Sherlock, come look at this!" Sherlock ran across the space under the tree's branches, dodging two and diving under another in a surprisingly nimble roll before John pulled him out of the way of the last branch, which Sherlock glared at suspiciously as though he hadn't been expecting it.

"What am I looking at, John?" he asked, still watching the branches as they flailed toward the boys like they thought trying harder might let them reach far enough to hit them.

"The hole at the base of the trunk – I think it's a tunnel. You were right. There's something under there."

Sherlock was beside himself, grinning like an idiot as he stepped forward for a closer look so that John had to pull him back again, glad that his friend was rail-thin and not overly difficult to haul around by the back of his robes. "Obvious!" Sherlock exclaimed, looking ashamed of himself for the first time John could remember, and calm enough that John decided he could let go of his robes.

"Sorry, John, I should have looked there first." He went back to studying the tree for a moment. "I think I can get to it." Before John could stop him, Sherlock darted forward, dodging the branches like he knew where they were going to come from before they got there – until one of them hit him across the right shoulder and sent him sprawling.

John was moving before his brain could catch up to his body, mimicking most of Sherlock's movements as he tried to get to his friend. Then he realized what he was doing, forgot what Sherlock had done, and moved on instinct, ducking, dodging, and rolling and getting no closer to his friend as he tried not to get hit. Luckily, he'd always been good at dodgeball.

He glanced toward Sherlock, who had managed to drag himself toward the trunk a little, but got distracted enough in that brief glance to miss a tree branch headed for him. It hit the side of his head with what felt like the force of a train and then he was on the ground, trying to roll out of the way of branches his eyes didn't seem to want to focus on. He got hit in the side next, hard enough that it started to be hard to breathe _and_ hard to see, and when the branches suddenly stopped, he was too relieved to wonder why.

"John, get over here!" Sherlock hissed, "It's a _long_ tunnel! Whatever it's hiding is _big_!" John tried to stand, but he couldn't seem to find his balance, so he crawled toward Sherlock instead, feeling like he was moving too slowly. The branches started moving again and Sherlock hit a knot on the side of the tree, stopping them again. So that was how it was done. John felt a moment of vague appreciation for Sherlock before the throbbing in his head erased it again.

Sherlock was looking at John as though he were a puzzle, now, like he'd been looking at the tree before. "Come on, let's get down into the tunnel," he said, but his words and his thoughts were clearly not the same. John had learned to recognize when Sherlock was thinking one thing and talking about something else, because it was a good hint that there was trouble coming. John nodded, then followed Sherlock as the taller boy crawled down into the hole. He thought if he hadn't been hit in the head, he would probably be having an easier time of the whole crawling thing, but as it was, he kept bumping into the walls, and Sherlock kept turning around to give him worried looks.

At the end of the tunnel, they came out into a tiny, filthy room full of furniture in even worse shape than John's desk. There were claw marks in the walls and the furniture, chairs with legs missing, tables with gouges across their tops – it wasn't anything as exciting as they'd hoped. Or, at least, as _John_ had hoped. Sherlock was looking around them like it was a marvel.

John sat down on the floor, head still ringing too much to stand, watching his friend dash back and forth across the room, looking at it from every possible angle. Then Sherlock's eyes met John's for a moment and he stopped running. "Oh! Sorry, John, I forgot." Sherlock muttered something John couldn't quite hear, and a jet of blue light shot out of his wand, hitting John in the head and clearing up his vision in an instant, the throbbing disappearing as his eyes started to focus again.

John stood up cautiously, testing out his balance. "Thanks. What was that spell?"

Sherlock waved a hand dismissively. "Fixes concussions. Should have remembered earlier. You might want to go see Madame Pomfrey when we get back anyway. 'S been a while since I did that one."

John wasn't sure why Sherlock knew an anti-concussion spell or what he'd have been using it for before now, but he didn't ask, because Sherlock had clearly stopped paying any attention to him at all, racing across the room one more time and then vanishing out the door to check out the next room over. John followed him, still moving tentatively, because while he certainly _felt_ like Sherlock had fixed him, he couldn't quite get past the feeling that he hadn't been able to trust his own body.

Sherlock looked like a kid in a candy shop, racing around and poking at things and banging on the walls and trying to solve the mystery. John could tell by looking around that whatever this place was, the explanation was sure to be another of those things that Sherlock called "obvious" but that was not obvious at all to a kid who had grown up muggle and still knew basically nothing about being a wizard. Instead of trying to solve the mystery, he just took in their surroundings.

Now that he'd gotten over the disappointment of it not being something big and grand and shining, it was actually pretty cool down here. It was like he and his friends had wanted their no-girls-allowed treehouse clubhouse to be when they were eight – all manly, solid furniture (or once-solid, at any rate) and no frills. Of course, when they were eight, they'd had to give it up because they had no furniture at all and what they could get away with filching from their houses was mostly frilly and girly and ridiculous, and besides that too heavy to haul into the tree.

Sherlock stopped his running after a moment, standing stock still in the middle of the room with his hands steepled together and his eyes closed, as if he were thinking very hard. Then his eyes snapped open and his face split into a broad grin. "Of course. Do you know where we are, John?"

John rolled his eyes. "Some secret run-down shack."

Sherlock whirled around dramatically, robes floating around him in a circle, and made a beeline for one of the windows. "Exactly. Or, _more_ exactly, we're in the _Shrieking_ Shack. Come look out the crack between the boards on the outside of this window." John followed him and looked where he'd been told to look, expecting the view to be some new angle of Hogwarts that Sherlock had used to figure out where on the grounds they were. Instead, he saw an unfamiliar town stretched out below them. It was small but looked pleasant, and he had no idea how they'd gotten here.

"That's not Hogwarts," he said vaguely. He didn't have to look at Sherlock to know that his best friend was rolling his eyes.

"'Course not. The Shrieking Shack's in Hogsmede. Everybody knows that."

John rolled his own eyes. "Everyone in _your_ world maybe. _I've_ never heard of it."

Sherlock gave him that look again, like he was a puzzle that needed working out. "Right," he said vaguely, "Muggle. Well anyway. That's Hogsmede, wizarding town right outside of Hogwarts. This," he turned around to gesture at the room they were standing in, "is the Shrieking Shack. 'Most haunted building in Britain,' they call it, except apparently it isn't, which is why it took me so long to figure out where we were. And now we've got a _much_ better way of sneaking out to the first Hogsmede weekend than the one I was _going_ to use, as soon as I figure out how to get in and out of the building without anyone knowing we were here."

John wasn't sure what any of that meant, really, but he _did_ know his best friend well enough to realize that they were about to be spending rather a lot of time in here. Something in Sherlock's face had changed as he turned away from the window to talk to John, and now he was looking around the room with a new look in his eyes, still intense, but with less wrinkling in the middle of his forehead, like he was planning instead of puzzling.

Well, hanging out here suited John fine. It was better than having Sherlock in his room all the time with the other Gryffindors mad about it, and it looked like even a bored Sherlock couldn't do much damage to it that hadn't already be done, which was something that couldn't be said of the curtains over John's bed.

"Shall we start straightening up in here, then?" he asked with a sigh. Sherlock nodded, waving his wand to reattach the leg to the broken chair. Sherlock knew an awful lot of magic, and it all seemed to be completely unrelated to the stuff they were doing in class, about half of which Sherlock failed to bother with because it didn't seem useful.

John was beginning to think Sherlock was right as he started rearranging the remains of the furniture by hand. Maybe it _wasn't_ useful. But he was going to do it anyway, because it was still _magic_and it was still cool. And now he could do it in here, where he could practice without looking silly in front of anyone but Sherlock, who seemed to find him vaguely silly a lot of the time anyway. This was going to be good. It was also going to take them forever to tidy up, and there was a good chance his homework would have to wait for the dead of night yet again, but John wasn't sure he cared. They had a place of their own now, and that mostly made it worth it.


	5. Flying and Fighting

The day of their first flying lesson, John woke up feeling almost as though he could fly himself, unassisted, from pure excitement. When Sherlock came over to the Gryffindor table for breakfast, he didn't even bother with his usual protests about Sherlock not being in Gryffindor. Sherlock wasn't going to leave and go back to his own table anyway, and today, John didn't care. Today, he even preferred it that way.

John had been excited about the proposition of flying since the moment he read in his school supply list that first years were not allowed their own brooms. It meant that non-first-years _were_ allowed their own brooms, and why would you bring a broom to a wizard school if you weren't going to fly it? Now that the day was finally here, it was all he could think about.

Sherlock said nothing as he sat down, and John noted absently, as he kept eating his breakfast, that both the silence and the sitting were unusual. Sherlock had very little interest in food, except for when he had all the interest in the world in it - the options seemed to be eating nothing or eating everything he could get his hands on, and neither was particularly conducive to John getting to eat breakfast _himself_, but today Sherlock's silence wasn't from a full mouth and his not eating wasn't because he was half pulling John's arm off in his excitement to go somewhere or do something. That was odd. But either way, he'd best keep focused on his breakfast because he never knew when Sherlock was going to have his next great idea and go leaping off expecting him to drop everything and come along.

Sherlock was deducing him now, because John hadn't said anything either. The excitement had him all tangled up inside, and there was breakfast, and he just wasn't sure what to _say_. He loved being outside and riding his bike and _moving_ and he missed playing football with the guys in his neighborhood and tearing around having bike races, and while he and Sherlock _did_ spend a lot of time outside, it was different here.

Outside was the place Sherlock could blow things up with the most impunity as he experimented with new spells and where he was least likely to get caught trying to invent a new potion. It wasn't a place to run around for the sake of running around, because that wasn't really Sherlock's thing. But flying for the sake of flying? Why not? Maybe he could get Sherlock to do it. Or maybe he could get Sherlock up in the air for some other reason - spying on Anderson, perhaps? - and he could fly at the same time, just because he was sure it would be awesome.

Sherlock was still quiet and he could feel his friend's eyes studying him, but John wasn't sure why because he was certain the other boy had figured out what he was thinking about by now - it couldn't be too hard, given that he'd been excited about flying all week. He started talking without any lead-in, assuming Sherlock wouldn't need it. "What's it like? Is it as much fun as it sounds?"

Sherlock didn't answer right away, and that was when John started to worry. Sherlock took great pride in showing off and for him not to leap on the chance to answer a question John hadn't actually asked all the way was a bad sign. Turning to look at the taller boy for the first time since he'd sat down, John noticed that his friend's back was ramrod straight and his head was held high and he hadn't even pretended to go for the food on the table. He looked like a tin soldier, sitting there stiffly and staring sort of purposefully at the wall in front of him as though he didn't want to meet John's eyes.

The not moving was disconcerting enough. The stiffness was doubly so. Sherlock spent at least half of his not-moving time in one of various positions that made him look like his spine was melting, so as to more effectively and dramatically look bored. This was something new. John wasn't sure he could handle something new with Sherlock. Old Sherlock was about as much trouble as he could deal with most of the time, though everything was better now that they had a hangout place that _wasn't_ John's dorm room.

"I don't know." Sherlock said crisply. "_Holmeses_ keep their feet on the _ground_, thank you very much." John almost laughed. Stiff Sherlock was really just _nervous_ Sherlock! He'd never seen his friend nervous about anything, because Sherlock seemed to believe that he was the smartest person in any room and that he could, therefore, outsmart everyone else if it came down to it. At the same time, it make John feel a little scared for the first time. If the kid who had singed his eyebrows off with a particularly explosive new experimental spell had never flown before, how dangerous did _that_ make it? And first years weren't allowed their own brooms - was that because flying was too dangerous for them to let 11-year-olds do it by themselves?

Before he could stop himself, the words slipped out. "But-but you're a wizard! You've never flown?"

Sherlock stiffened further, something John hadn't even thought possible. "_You're_ a wizard and _you've _never flown," he pointed out.

John wasn't used to thinking of himself as a wizard. That was entirely beside the point. "You know what I mean," he said defensively, "You _grew up_ as a wizard."

Sherlock looked down toward the table, back still straight and voice still stiff. "I _do_ know what you mean. But my parents have both had bad experiences with flying and my mother won't allow it. And anyway, _Mycroft_ says it's not that great." Sherlock's eyes flicked sideways toward John for a moment, and he added "And don't give me that look, John, My's not always _completely_ horrible."

John wasn't sure what exactly his face had done that Sherlock disapproved of, but he _did_ know that this was the first time Sherlock had talked about Mycroft as though the Head Boy were, in fact, his older brother and not some repulsive slug he'd found under a rock somewhere and that had subsequently begun telling him idiotic things he couldn't trust.

John tried to get his face under control and stop looking however it was that he looked. This was apparently something Sherlock had actual honest-to-goodness feelings about, in a deeper way than his usual bored-or-not-bored dichotomy, and John had probably better be supportive, because he wasn't sure what a _really_ emotional Sherlock would be like. And he was almost completely certain he didn't want to know.

John shoved Sherlock with his shoulder in an unusually physical moment of . . . something. He tried not to encourage Sherlock to touch him, given his friend's proclivity for grabbing his hand when excited and not letting go in spite of John's embarrassment, and so they weren't really the punch-on-the-shoulder kind of friends, but at the moment it seemed like the thing to do. Sherlock almost tipped over because he hadn't been prepared for the motion and then turned toward him, surprised, his spine relaxing just a little bit for the first time.

John wasn't sure quite what to say. "We'll be fine," he began. "No sense worrying." Then he had an idea that might actually calm Sherlock down. Not that he thought anyone else would notice that Sherlock _needed_ calming down. "Anyway, they're giving _Anderson_ a broom, so how hard could it really be?"

Sherlock snorted in an almost-laugh that, any time he could elicit it, made John feel funnier than he did when other people laughed until they cried. Sherlock didn't think much was funny. Just interesting or uninteresting. John grinned proudly. Sherlock returned the smile, spine relaxing into normalcy. Then he shoved John back with his own shoulder and said nothing. What he meant was thank you. It was ok, because John understood. He was pretty sure he was the only one at school who spoke Sherlock, but that was alright, because he was also good at it.

John spent the rest of the morning fidgeting through Charms class. Professor Flitwick gave him a stern look over his eyeglasses, but let him be. John tried his best to keep his extra energy hidden under the desk, where his right leg was jiggling up and down like mad. He couldn't _really_ be expected to sit still and listen with something as exciting as _flying lessons_ happening this afternoon, could he? He tried anyway, but it was mostly a useless effort.

Sherlock apparently fretted through his own morning class, because he came back to the Gryffindor table looking just as terrified as before. This time, John decided that if talking it out at breakfast hadn't kept Sherlock calm, the best way to chill his friend out was probably to act like everything was completely normal, so he made his usual protests about Sherlock needing to sit at his own table and then stuck to his guns so that the familiar argument took up all of their lunch time without Sherlock having much time to think about brooms or flying or any of it.

And then in a reversal of the usual pattern, John grabbed Sherlock's wrist and dragged him outside for their first flying lesson, letting his own excitement set the pace and hoping that his reluctant best friend would find the whole being-hauled-around-at-top-speed thing as disorienting as John himself did and would end up outside without having to think too hard about that, either.

Outside, Madame Hooch was waiting for the first years behind two neat rows of brooms. A quick count of each row, empty because they'd beaten the others here, proved that she had intended one side to be for the Gryffindors and the other to be for the Slytherins, but the fact that Sherlock had grabbed John's wrist the moment John let go of him and still hadn't let go proved just as certainly that it wasn't going to happen. John had accepted, at this point, that being seen in public with Sherlock was inevitably going to be embarrassing in some way or another and didn't jerk his arm away. At least Sherlock seemed to have figured out that John would rather not actually hold hands and he was getting better about grabbing John's wrist instead. Though at the moment, holding his hand would probably make Sherlock easier to steer.

Avoiding Madame Hooch's intense yellow gaze, John slid his hand down to grab Sherlock's, blushing slightly, and then dragged his friend over to the two brooms closest to the professor on the Slytherin side. He was certain that none of the other Gryffindors would be willing to stand on the Slytherin side if he gave Sherlock one of "their" brooms, but he hoped that Anderson would cross over to stand by Sally without too much trouble, like he did in Potions class, where the rearranging they did the first day had managed to stick after the third time Sherlock drew Anderson into a fight.

Instead, Anderson walked up in the middle of a clump of Slytherins who all protested loudly about the presence of a _Gryffindor_ on _their_ side of the class's space until Madame Hooch silenced them with a sharp clearing of her throat. "If you'll all find a broom, you'll find that there _are_ enough for everyone. We won't be staying in these lines for long, so you needn't worry about them."

She cast a stern glance around at everyone else, and a vaguely pitying one at Sherlock that made him drop John's hand like it had burned him and pull his shoulders back to look more confident. John almost grinned. If there was any way to get Sherlock Holmes to do something he didn't want to do, it was to present it as a challenge, and pitying looks were _always_ a challenge where Sherlock was concerned. "Now, hold your hand over your broom and say 'Up!' Make sure you're very confident - a broom can sense the confidence of its rider."

Sherlock's voice came out fastest and loudest, and his broom shot up so fast that he almost didn't catch it. Grinning at his friend's success, John ordered his own broom up, speaking calmly but clearly to it. It leapt effortlessly into his hand and he caught it without even trying. Sherlock gave him a sideways look that might have been pride, but could also have been jealousy. John was pretty sure Sherlock's little bobble with the broom was the least elegant thing he'd ever seen Sherlock do in class. He was usually all flair and finesse, while John scrambled along behind him being merely competent. It was nice to have the tables turned.

Everything went well until they were all in the air together. John was surprised by how natural this all felt. Everything Madame Hooch said seemed perfectly obvious, like it didn't need to be said at all, and the only indication that any of her instructions were difficult was that other people seemed to be having trouble.

John wanted to ignore them all and go racing ahead of the instructions. They moved up and down and forward and backward, moving slowly and carefully and not very far. John was sure he could go faster. He was sure he could figure out how to turn on his own, without having to wait for everyone else to catch up. Was this how Sherlock felt all the time? Did he _always_ want to leap ahead of everyone and just _go_?

Sherlock was picking this up faster than most of the muggle-born kids, but the majority of the wizard kids had flown before, some of them often, and he was clearly learning it _now_. You couldn't usually watch Sherlock Holmes learn something. You could usually only stand behind him in his dust as he blasted straight past you, skipped the learning stage, and simply did things. Anderson's face twisted into a smirk - he'd noticed it, too, and he was about to take advantage. Sherlock routinely made Anderson look silly in their classes. It was his favorite sport. John didn't expect Anderson to let a chance to turn the tables pass him by.

John was completely unsurprised when, the moment Madame Hooch turned her back to them so that she could help one of the Gryffindors - Sarah, who was drifting slowly backward and couldn't figure out how to stop - Anderson rode his broom all the way up to Sherlock's and started talking quietly to him.

John urged his broom carefully forward and tried what he thought should be turning. It was! He came up on Sherlock's other side, coming as close as he could get to his best friend in spite of the fact that Madame Hooch had asked them to leave space between their brooms so that they didn't run into each other. He caught the tail end of whatever Anderson was saying, the words "your broom," before the boy moved back off to the side and out of the way. His tone of voice seemed to indicate that whatever it was, it had been some sort of a threat.

John glared at Anderson, but without hearing the actual threat, he didn't know what to say. Sherlock flew carefully backwards, showing none of the reckless abandon he flung himself about with on the ground. The boy next to Anderson, an unpleasant fellow named Jenkins, laughed. "You're right," he said, quietly enough that only the few of them in this tight clump of brooms could hear, "He _can't_ fly! What kind of a blood traitor grows up in a wizard house and can't even _fly_?"

John didn't know what a "blood traitor" was, but he knew fighting words when he heard them and he was completely unsurprised when Sherlock whispered vehemently back, "Well, what kind of an inbred _moron_ can't perform a simple _fire_ spell?"

Great. Just great. John knew before the sentence was out that Jenkins and Anderson, sensing that they actually had an advantage over Sherlock for once in their lives, weren't going to take that one lying down. "Let's push him off his broom!" Jenkins said at a half-shout, loudly enough to draw Madame Hooch's attention.

She blew loudly on her whistle and John could half see her turning toward them from the corner of his eye, but he was more concerned with the fact that both Jenkins and Anderson were suddenly riding their brooms straight toward Sherlock. Sherlock shot backwards again, much faster this time, and Jenkins seemed completely unprepared for it and shot out in front of Sherlock, through the space where he'd been before. Anderson _was_ prepared and adjusted his course.

John moved with pure instinct. "Sherlock! DOWN!" Surprised, Sherlock dropped abruptly downward, almost falling off his broom with the speed of his dive, and John shot over the top of him, faster than he'd gone on the broom at all so far, and pointed his own broom toward Anderson, who clearly had no idea at all of how to react to this sudden shift in the situation.

John hit Anderson squarely in the chest with the end of his broom, knocking the Slytherin clear off his own broom with a loud thumping sound. Then he realized abruptly what he'd done and acted on instinct again, dropping into a steep dive in the hope that he could fall faster than Anderson and catch him somehow. He couldn't, and he didn't realize it fast enough.

Anderson hit the ground with a loud thud, and John hit the ground a moment later, the handle of his broom breaking off with a loud crack as it hit the ground in front of him. Both managed to get their arms under them - John could feel the impact rattling all the way up his arms and numbing them, and his wrists quite hurt from the impact. He could also tell from the tight whiteness around Anderson's eyes that it had been worse for the other boy, because John's broom had broken his fall, and Anderson's broom was still up in the air where he'd left it.

Madame Hooch was on them in an instant, hauling them both to their feet, fussing over Anderson, who had apparently broken both wrists, and lecturing them both. Honestly, John wasn't listening. He wasn't even trying to. He'd _knocked Anderson off a broom_! The thought felt like a punch to the gut. Sherlock was never going to understand how guilty John felt about this whole thing. He was also never going to understand how John could feel so guilty but still feel certain that, given the choice, he would do the same thing all over again.

In the infirmary, Madame Pomfrey recognized John by sight, which was probably a bad sign, but took care of Anderson first, which made John feel a bit less guilty. Madame Hooch explained the entire fight to the nurse (there was more lecturing in there, too, and this time John heard it because he was less wrapped up in the shock of the whole thing) and then mentioned that she was afraid one or both of them might have hit their heads pretty hard.

Even wizards didn't mess around with head injuries, and John and Anderson (whose first name, apparently, was Stewart, because that's what Madame Pomfrey kept calling him) were quickly installed in hospital beds on either side of the room, separated by a double layer of curtains and both smarting from a combination of actual injury and the added insult of losing 30 points each for their respective houses. John had wanted to protest that Anderson had gone after Sherlock first and he'd only been defending his friend, but he hadn't, because he was still feeling guilty enough about Anderson's broken wrists to think maybe he deserved the lost points. At least, he felt guilty until he was about an hour into listening to Anderson whining on the other side of the room about basically everything.

No one was allowed to visit them, another element of their punishment and a preventative measure to keep their friends from starting up another fight or encouraging them over this one. Sherlock still somehow managed to get a chocolate frog to John, which, once opened, contained a note in place of the famous wizard card. It said one word, "Thanks," and John almost laughed, because of _course_ that would be all Sherlock thought to say. Not thanks _for_ something. Not thanks-and-I'll-make-it-up-to-you. Just "Thanks." Because that was what you were _supposed_ to say, and Sherlock _did_ understand the most basic of social cues. He just understood _only_ the most basic of them.

Either way, the chocolate frog itself was good, and John appreciated the sentiment, as inelegantly as it was expressed. Madame Pomfrey, still stern and stiff like she was angry with them, enforced strict homework time, dinner time, and then bedtime, and as he fell asleep, John found himself thinking not about hurting Anderson or protecting Sherlock or being in trouble, but about how good it had felt to be on a broom. He'd _liked_ it, even when he was attacking Anderson. He'd felt completely in control and it had felt easy, for the first time since he'd gotten here.

Maybe it was having Sherlock there in comparison most of the time, but he'd felt like everything here was hard and strange and new. And now flying was _easy_ and strange and new. Maybe if he was very polite and apologetic and promised not to attack any more of his classmates or break any more brooms, Madame Hooch would let him join the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws when they had their flying lesson tomorrow, so that he could catch up on the stuff he missed. He fell asleep happy, in spite of everything.


	6. Midnight Meetings

John was woken up what felt like only moments after he'd fallen asleep by a prefect, a 6th-year Ravenclaw girl who held her finger to her lips. John sat up, blinking, and she waved at him to get up quietly and follow her, casting a glance across the infirmary that indicated she didn't want Anderson woken up.

He looked around. He didn't know what this was about, but he _did_ know that Sherlock wasn't here. Neither was Mrs. Hudson. And those were the only two people he was used to waking him up in the middle of the night. But. . . this girl was a prefect, the badge on her robes shining clearly in the moonlight, and she was a Ravenclaw and therefore unlikely to be involved with any kind of revenge plot by Anderson's friends, and when she waved a second time, John got up and followed her.

Part of him still felt he shouldn't, but the other part had always liked a mystery, and that mystery-loving part of him was hale and hearty after a month or so of being dragged around by his perpetually tight-lipped best friend. He was starting to like the thrill of not knowing where he was going or what he was doing. Admittedly, he liked it a bit less when he was following strange prefects around, but he still couldn't quite resist the urge to go along and see whatever it was she was leading him toward.

The girl led him around in what _had_ to be circles, and even though he'd been certain that he and Sherlock knew the castle as well as anyone now, maybe better, he was soon lost anyway. The girl seemed to be trying deliberately to confuse him. That was interesting. He tried to remember as much as he could, sure that Sherlock could put the pieces together and find the place he'd been, even if he couldn't find it again himself.

He thought they might be in the dungeons, though they'd gone both up and down so many different flights of stairs that he couldn't be utterly certain. The advantage to a long route was that they passed plenty of things that could be landmarks, even if they weren't landmarks he recognized already. Not that, in this castle, landmarks couldn't change, but still. He felt fairly confident that Sherlock could find this place, and it had been a good distraction from the fact that the longer he spent walking, the more nervous he was about where he was going. The girl opened the door to a room on the left side of the corridor and waved for him to go in. John took a deep breath for a moment, and then walked through the door, trying not to look as nervous as he felt.

The room turned out to be an empty classroom - not one he'd been in before because it didn't have any windows, like most of his classrooms did, and because it definitely wasn't his Potions room. The desks were lined up in neat rows like it might be in use, unlike some of the abandoned classrooms he and Sherlock had been in that didn't have any furniture at all. There was a layer of dust over everything that indicated that in spite of the furniture, the room probably wasn't used often, if it was still used at all.

At the front of the room was a large, wide desk, clearly for a teacher. Mycroft Holmes was leaning casually against it, his umbrella propped up beside him. He was wearing the same pinstriped robes he'd been wearing on the train, in spite of the fact that their uniforms were meant to be black, and John suddenly realized that the only times he'd seen Mycroft without the stripes were when the Head Boy was going directly in and out of class.

He even wore the pinstripes at meals, which was probably not allowed, but John couldn't quite imagine anyone telling Mycroft that. If Sherlock was any indication, you didn't tell the Holmes brothers to do _anything_. They just did what they were going to do. And at least Mycroft made nods toward the rules, like wearing black robes to class. Sherlock just ran right over them like they weren't even there.

The elder Holmes brother nodded to the girl in the doorway. "Thank you, Anthea. You can wait outside." John turned to look at her, suddenly dismayed at the thought of her leaving, even though he hadn't felt particularly comfortable being with her to begin with. She nodded and stepped backward into the corridor, closing the door behind her. It shut with a soft click that made John's insides feel squirmy.

He could almost feel Mycroft studying him again, even with his head turned toward the door. He didn't know how he felt about that. Sherlock had mostly stopped studying him like he was some sort of specimen in a jar, but that was probably more through familiarity than anything else. And Mycroft had made him feel more uncomfortable on the train than Sherlock's studying him ever did. Still, he was here, wasn't he? He might as well act like he'd _meant_ to come meet Mycroft, even if his first instinct, had he known what was going on, would have been to stay away. He turned back around, trying to straighten his shoulders slowly enough that Mycroft wouldn't notice that he was pulling himself up to look bigger.

The intensity faded from Mycroft's eyes almost as soon as John had turned around, as though the older boy didn't want to let on that he was still studying his brother's best friend. Instead, he waved a relaxed arm toward one of the student desks. "Do sit down, John."

John found himself following the order almost before he could think about it, but then he realized that he didn't want to give Mycroft that kind of power over him. He'd heard enough from Sherlock to know that Mycroft fancied himself secretly in charge of everything. Everything but Sherlock himself, and John rather liked the idea of being on the exceptions list with Sherlock, even if his friend's assertions that Mycroft was a "power-mad lunatic" were a bit exaggerated. He sat down on top of the desk, rather than in its seat, putting himself at least _closer_ to eye level with Mycroft.

The head boy laughed, a resonant, if clipped, sound John hadn't expected at all. "Terribly sorry, John, but I seem to have misjudged you rather badly. We should have had this conversation absolute _ages_ ago."

John wasn't sure what to say to that, but he wanted to seem quite grown-up and unintimidated, so he answered back, "Apology accepted."

Mycroft's face twisted into an amused smile. John got the feeling that he could have laughed but had decided not to. Like he was playing along with some kind of game John only vaguely understood the rules of. "Indeed," Mycroft said with faint amusement.

Then they settled into a moment of silence until John asked, "So, why did you bring me here?" He realized after the words came out that he'd just given all the power in this conversation back to Mycroft and that was probably what the other boy wanted all along. If Mycroft was playing some kind of game, he was already winning.

"I brought you here to talk about my brother," Mycroft announced, "You'll forgive me if I assumed, when you sorted into Gryffindor, that the house conflict would drive you two apart, especially given Sherlock's. . . proclivity . . . for frustrating and irritating others." Power games. John could tell.

John straightened his spine, trying to look taller. "I will not. If you _really_ thought I could have been a Hufflepuff, you should have known better. Loyalty and all that. A real man doesn't abandon his friends just because other people don't like them. And anyway, I _like_ Sherlock."

Mycroft was smiling again, but this time something about it had started to reach his eyes. John thought that was probably a good sign. "Yes," the older boy commented, "I can see that." Mycroft pushed himself up away from the desk, standing fully on his feet instead of leaning backward and John almost shrank backward a little bit before he remembered that he wasn't giving Mycroft any more power than he could help. "In that case," Mycroft continued, "You probably don't like me much. I'm assuming Sherlock's still going around calling me his 'archenemy'?"

John's forehead wrinkled. "Don't be ridiculous," he answered, "Real people don't have archenemies." Sherlock was dramatic, but he wasn't _that_ dramatic. Was he?

Mycroft laughed again, a little less restrictedly this time. "I think if you brought that up with Sherlock, he might find it a bit dull. Maybe you don't know my brother as well as I thought."

John took offense at that. "Of course I do! Nobody else at school knows him as well as me!"

Mycroft turned his back and picked up his umbrella. "No, I can see what's going on here. You simply like the _mystery_ of hanging out with my brother. You'll never get to _really_ know him. You don't really want to. And, of course, you're _completely_ useless to me. . ."

John was on his feet before Mycroft, umbrella in hand, could finish turning around. "I do _too_ know him! And I bet I _am_ useful! I bet I could tell you _anything_ about Sherlock!"

Mycroft stopped, setting the end of his umbrella against the floor and leaning onto the curved handle as though it were a cane. "Can you _really_?"

John had forgotten all about keeping the power out of Mycroft's hands and not letting himself be manipulated. He charged onward. "Yes! I can! Did you know, he was _actually nervous_ about flying today? And then he said _you_ said it wasn't that great, like it was _actually_ a comforting thought? And then you drag his one real friend down here so you can call him frustrating and irritating and tell me I shouldn't be friends with him? What kind of a rubbish brother _are_ you?" By the end of his speech, he was two steps closer to Mycroft and standing on his tiptoes trying to pretend he wasn't at least a foot shorter than the 7th year.

Mycroft's facial expression was angry, but his eyes glittered with something that looked more like triumph. "I'm the kind of brother who wants to know if his kid brother's friends are protecting him out of genuine friendship or if they're going to abandon him if there turn out to be more fist fights," Mycroft retorted.

Then his shoulders deflated and his voice grew softer. "I just want to make sure he's really going to be ok - I should have been there for him today, and I wasn't. I needed to know you would be. For real. If you couldn't see that I was just worried for my brother, then I'm sorry." He was almost pleading with John now, and the first-year couldn't help feeling a bit sorry for the older boy.

John reached up and patted Mycroft on the shoulder. "Well, chin up, then," he said stiffly, not quite sure how to deal with the emotions in the room, now. "He's got me. I'll look after him."

Then Mycroft said it. "Oh, that's such a relief. But you know, while you're looking after him, could you do me a favor? Could you meet me back here in a few days to talk about him? Just so I can be sure you haven't changed your mind, you understand, and so I can hear about what he's been doing. I'd _so_ like to know more about what he's been up to, but I _know_ if I ask him myself, he'll just run away. He's never liked to talk to me about anything. If you could just give me a few regular updates on how he's doing, it would really put my mind at ease. And I'm sure I could do something for you in return. Perhaps set up some private flying lessons? You seem to have taken to it rather well, by all accounts."

John almost agreed to do it. Then the full weight of it all sunk in. If he spent time with Sherlock and then told Mycroft about what Sherlock was doing, then Mycroft would get him flying lessons? That didn't sound like a favor. That sounded like a bribe. A wave of anger washed over him, sending a hot blush through his cheeks. "Wait a minute! Are you asking me to _spy_ on Sherlock?"

Mycroft took a step back, apparently affronted, but this time, John saw through the act. "Spying, of course not! Why would I want you to _spy_ on my brother, John? Honestly, I just want to make sure he's doing alright!"

John glared at him, stepping forward again, as he had last time he told off the older boy, until he was nearly yelling directly into Mycroft's sternum. "No. _You_ want me to spy on him, because if all you want is to know if he's alright, you can do that through the rumor mill. You already know about the flying lesson thing, _and_ you know I saved him, _and_ you know he's fine. _You_ want me to _spy_ on him so that he doesn't mess up your _plans_! Or whatever you've got going on here, anyway."

Mycroft started talking again, pleading in earnest this time, but John was still too angry at what looked like a brother betraying a brother to listen. "Come on, John, you can't think _that_ badly of me. . ."

John ignored him, turning on his heel and charging toward the door. "Good _night_, Mycroft. I'll tell _Sherlock_ you were worried. But I'm not telling _you_ anything."

Anthea was on the other side of the door, but she didn't even meet John's eyes, looking over his shoulder at Mycroft instead. The older boy cleared his throat sharply. "I think you'd best walk young Watson here back to the Hospital Wing before he gets lost," the boy said stiffly, all traces of begging and bargaining and pretense gone. He'd lost the argument, and he knew it. "Although," the older boy continued, "he doesn't seem very afraid of getting lost, if he's willing to leave without asking for directions back. He doesn't even seem very afraid of _me_."

The way Mycroft said the last bit sounded almost like a threat, like John _should_ be afraid of him. John refused to let it get to him. "That's because _you_ don't seem very _frightening_!" he answered, shutting the door on the older boy before Anthea could say anything at all. Then he started walking in the direction he'd come from. He would find his _own_ way back to the Hospital Wing, and Mycroft Holmes's generosity be damned!

Anthea soon caught up in spite of him, her longer legs striding effortlessly down the hall even as he hurried along. "You know, he's really not all that bad. He does _mean_ well, and things move a lot more smoothly around here with him as Head Boy. It's just a lot of responsibility, you know, and if he's a bit . . ." she paused to choose her words, "_non-traditional_ about it, then that's really not the _end_ of the world, is it? He's balancing a lot of different things right now."

John didn't know what those things were. He didn't care. "Well, you can tell Mycroft that as long as Sherlock's just another _thing_ to be _balanced_ for him, he might as well stay out of it. _I'll_ look after Sherlock, and _he_ can look after '_things'_."

John tried not to think too hard about how much he'd wished he had an older brother instead of Harry. He'd spent a lot of his childhood wishing his sister were different and dreaming of some mythical older sibling who would look after him and help him out in tough spots and give him advice when the kids at school were hard to deal with and the whole nine yards.

Harry was apathetic toward him, at best, not really interested in his life or what was going on in it because she was usually so wrapped up in herself. Mycroft had seemed like exactly what John wanted - he'd found Sherlock a friend on the first train ride, first thing, and he'd seemed like he _would_ be supportive if Sherlock just stopped hating him. Now? John wasn't so sure.

"Honestly," he huffed, "Spying on his own brother. He should be ashamed." Anthea said nothing. She seemed to have decided it wasn't worth arguing over. And maybe it wasn't. And maybe not having arguments you didn't need to have was just how you dealt with having a Holmes in your life.

They reached the Hospital Wing in what seemed like no time at all, but John was too upset to keep track of the route.

Once John was back in bed by himself, he almost couldn't fall asleep. Spying. Ridiculous. He was going to have to keep an eye out for anyone who might be a nefarious mole sent by Mycroft to wreak havoc on Sherlock's existence. Maybe Sherlock _did_ have an archenemy. But if John could deal with Anderson and Jenkins on brooms, he could deal with Mycroft on the ground. And that was the thought that eventually sent him back off to sleep, to dream of James Bond and broomsticks.


	7. Tryouts and Trouble

**Sorry this took so long, guys. I'm pretty sure I rewrote this chapter at least 4 or 5 times before I got it the way I wanted it. *eyeroll***

* * *

The tryouts for the house quidditch teams came the day after the first Hogsmeade trip for the older kids, and John was so excited and nervous that the way Sherlock glared around them all morning as though he were deeply puzzled by something didn't even spark his interest. He noticed that Sherlock was quiet, but he put his friend's silence down to disappointment over the fact that they hadn't been ready to sneak out of the Shack and go to Hogsmede themselves yesterday, and he put it out of his mind, focusing on the tryout instead.

John's tryout was just practice for next year, but that didn't make it any less stressful. He kept telling himself that first years never made the team anyway and it was going to be much easier to try out next year, when he might have a real chance, if he got a practice tryout in now. That was what Mike Stamford, a round-faced Hufflepuff boy from John's herbology class, had told him. Mike might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he was also scrupulously honest - even, sometimes, tactlessly so - and John tended to believe him, at least on things like this.

John had been assured by about half of the wizard-born kids in his classes that he was sure to be an excellent beater, and once he'd had quidditch explained to him, he'd had to admit that it sounded like fun. Besides which, he was as in love with flying now as he'd been after the first lesson and any excuse to be on a broom was good enough for him. Breaking the silence at the breakfast table, John turned to Sherlock and asked, "So, do you think I'll do alright at the tryout? I mean, I've never played before, and obviously I won't actually _make_ the team, but do you think I'll do alright?"

Sherlock looked through John as though he didn't really see him, still focused on the students around them. "I think there's a better-than-average chance of you doing well, yes," he said absently. After one more long look around the room, he turned toward John again, this time focusing on his friend's face as though he was present. "You know, John, I think I'll come with you and watch. Should be interesting, at any rate."

John raised an eyebrow. "Interesting?" It was hard to imagine Sherlock being interested in anything as mundane as a quidditch tryout. It was hard to imagine Sherlock being interested in _q__uidditch_. John might have imagined him having an interest in whatever the wizarding equivalent of polo was, but something about Sherlock's fine clothes and upright bearing just didn't suggest an interest in middle-class sporting events.

Sherlock either hadn't picked up on John's incredulity, or he'd chosen to ignore it, because all he said was, "Yes. Interesting." Then he stood up, taking another long look around the room, and announced, "I'll see you at the tryout, then. I've a few things to do before then." John assumed Sherlock was talking about the invisibility cloak (well, blanket - they didn't have an extra cloak) he was trying to make so that they would be able to sneak out into Hogsmede on the next trip without getting caught. It was such difficult magic that even Sherlock was struggling with it, and if Sherlock was really willing to work on it alone, without John there to watch him and listen to him vent about it, that was probably better.

John nodded, and Sherlock strode off across the Great Hall, leaving him alone at the Gryffindor table to worry about his tryout some more. He knew he shouldn't worry. It was pointless. He wasn't going to make the team no matter how he did, so there was no reason to be putting pressure on himself. But he couldn't seem to help it.

* * *

John was surprised to find that he wasn't the only one at the tryout with a school broom. A red-haired second year, who introduced himself as Billy, was also clutching a borrowed broom, though his knuckles weren't quite as white around the handle as John's were. "Nervous?" the boy asked.

"I'm trying not to be," John replied, "because I'm only a first-year and it's only a practice tryout for next year, but it's hard not to feel nervous anyway."

The boy nodded. "I think I'd probably feel that way, but my brothers helped me practice all summer long, so I ought to be alright. Well, some of them. The twins and Ron aren't old enough for proper brooms yet and Percy's not much help - he's only six - but Charlie's 10 and he's brilliant, and he was _loads_ of help. I bet Charlie makes it once he's a second year. I'm only hoping I do, too."

John wasn't sure what to day to that. He had a hard time imagining Harry letting him help her with _anything_, and he knew for sure that even if it happened, his sister would never talk about him that way. She'd call him a brat and whine about how he thought he was better than her, when most people who knew him knew that was ridiculous. "Well, good luck," he said after a moment, "I hope you make it."

Billy grinned. "I hope you do too - you know, next year."

John was halfway through thanking Billy for the sentiment when an older boy in dark red quidditch robes stepped out onto the pitch and held his hands up for silence. A clump of older students a few feet away kept talking while the boy cleared his throat a couple of times and then, with a sigh, resorted to picking up the whistle around his neck and blowing loudly into it. The 6th and 7th years quieted, and everyone turned toward the boy.

"Hello," he announced loudly, "My name is Greg Lestrade and I am your Team Captain for this year." A wave of mutters broke out from the older kids and he cleared his throat again, raising his voice one level louder as he declared, "I am perfectly aware that not everyone is happy about a fourth year being the Team Captain. You are going to have to get over that, because we are _going to win_ this year, and if you can't work with me, we're just going to have to do it without you. Thank you."

The mutters continued, but Lestrade ignored them. John had to admire his ability to just keep going regardless of the chaos and bad attitudes around him. "All right, now, if you could all group up by position, I'll take chasers over here," he indicated one side of the pitch, "beaters over there," he indicated the other side, "and anyone trying out for Keeper or Seeker in the middle."

John knew where to go, but all of a sudden the prospect of really stepping out onto the pitch to get there was a terrifying one. He turned to Billy again. "So, um, what position are you going for?"

Billy laughed. "Still nervous, huh? Me too. Dunno why having the Captain out here ought to make it scarier, but it does. Anyway, I'm going for chaser, so don't worry about me. You're going for beater anyway, aren't you? 'Cause you're that one that knocked the Slytherin off his broom, aren't you? We all heard about it. And anyway, it sounds like you're a natural, like my brother Charlie, so I'm sure you'll be fine." He shoved John lightly on the shoulder. "Go on over there. If I can try out, you can too."

John nodded. "Right. Thanks. Good luck." It sort of helped. Mostly. And at least the shove had gotten him moving. He joined the group of beaters, most of whom were much older and towered over him, and waited for his next set of instructions. He wasn't sure what to expect from the tryout. Would the captain want to see him fly? He could probably handle that. Would he have to hit stuff out of the air with his club? He'd played enough cricket that he hoped he could do that. He'd never tried to hit something in flight before. It was probably going to be hard from the air. Were they going to use actual bludgers? Those sounded dangerous, but Captain Lestrade wouldn't _really_ let him get hurt at the tryout, would he?

The tryouts started with the Chasers, which gave John rather too much time to stew about it all. The older kids around him seemed restless, like they might be nervous too, but the way they were glaring irritably at him and looking around at each other with distrust made the thought of saying anything a terrifying one, so he kept his mouth shut. He'd found a reasonably kind-looking girl to stand next to, a 5th year who looked like she might not try to kill him just for daring to show up at her tryout as a 1st-year, but he still wasn't quite brave enough to ask her what they'd actually be doing. He just waited. And worried. And waited some more. And tried not to watch anything that was going on in the air because he was certain it would make him nauseous if he looked.

* * *

John's tryout went fairly well, he thought. He was a bit miffed that Sherlock had never made his promised appearance in the stands, but, he told himself, it wasn't like he'd _actually_ expected Sherlock to make it back in time once he'd gone off on his own anyway. Sherlock had an irritating habit of getting so involved in whatever it was that he was doing that he didn't remember to do things like eat or sleep or show up for class unless John showed up to make him.

Lestrade had known perfectly well who John was and had given him a longer tryout than the other students had gotten, starting off with a perfectly normal muggle football that John had to hit with the bat until he got the hang of swinging and flying at the same time and Lestrade felt he was ready to try with a real bludger.

The kids still on the ground, waiting for their own turns, had made paranoid comments asking why Lestrade would spend so much time on a first year if he didn't intend to put him on the team just to spite them all, and as they grew louder and louder on the ground, John had gotten more and more nervous. Even so, the Captain had been spot on with his timing, and John had managed to keep the bludger away from both himself and Lestrade, who had sat calmly in the air and watched John work without much visible concern that the bludger would hit him with John there keeping it away.

Sherlock appeared at his shoulder as John watched the last tryout of the day - the Seekers. "I've got to ask Lestrade a few questions," he announced calmly.

John raised an eyebrow, "If it's about you having missed my tryout, I doubt there's anything he can do about it. He's already finished trying out the beaters."

Sherlock wrinkled his forehead, "Missed your - Oh, don't be silly, John! I wasn't about to sit in the stands where everyone could see me watching, was I? There would have been a riot. They'd have attacked me as a 'Slytherin spy.' And anyway, Lestrade set me up a hiding spot when I told him I was coming to watch. And now we've got to talk to him, because I have _questions_."

John rolled his eyes. Sherlock had definitely not decided to hide on his own. Sherlock had no idea how other people saw him or related to him. Not really. He treated other people's thoughts and feelings as interesting when you needed to know about them and irrelevant when you didn't. Maybe one day he would understand those thoughts and feelings better but right now, he deleted all that information too often to make much sense of people who weren't John. And he was completely unconcerned with what John's fellow gryffindors thought of him, either way.

No, this could be put down entirely to Lestrade's good influence. How the older boy had managed to get Sherlock to _agree_ that he needed to hide out of the way and keep from disrupting the proceedings, John had no idea, but he was starting to like the fourth-year more and more the longer the tryouts went on. He really hoped he made the team next year, because he was sure Lestrade was going to run a successful one.

John let Sherlock take the credit for the hiding idea and moved on. He almost asked what questions Sherlock could possibly have, but that would really just be encouraging him, and John wasn't sure he wanted to let Sherlock take over this moment like he had all the other moments that had been important to John this school year. "So, how do you think I did?" he asked instead.

Sherlock looked over at him, surprised. "Well, you're a natural, of course, aren't you? Everyone's already said it, dunno why you need me to say it again. _I_ think he's going to make you a backup for the team and everyone else be damned. Especially after what I've got to _ask_ him about."

Sherlock was clearly desperate to tell John what he'd seen as he watched the tryouts, leaning slightly forward onto the balls of his feet so that he looked like he might fly away at any moment from pure excitement. He'd planned some sort of dramatic reveal, no doubt, because he had that particular sparkle in his eye that always meant he was looking forward to making some big announcement and shocking them all. John sighed and asked the question his best friend was clearly waiting for. "What have you got to ask that's so important?"

Sherlock narrowed his eyes dramatically and leaned forward, dropping his voice to an intense, secretive half-whisper. "You _must_ have noticed the strange behavior in the Great Hall this morning. Mostly from the people trying out for quidditch teams today. Irritability, anxiousness, restlessness, paranoia, unusual aggressiveness, rapid breathing, hand tremors, loss of coordination - and nobody seemed much interested in eating breakfast . . ."

Sherlock was clearly building up to something he thought was shocking and dramatic, but John was fairly certain whatever it was didn't deserve this kind of build up. He rolled his eyes. "Sherlock, that's called_ nerves_. You were a mess before that first flying lesson and no one criticized _you_!"

Sherlock shook his head, leaning even closer to John and holding up a single, dramatic finger. "Ah, but not this time, John. _This_ time it's a potion. Some kind of stimulant. Probably an illegal one. Likely sold as something to help them focus or give them more energy when they all bought it in Hogsmede yesterday. They're all on illegal potions. And I've _got_ to ask if he knows about it. Because we're going to have to find out where they're coming from."

John had no idea what to make of that. "What, you mean - they're on drugs? Like, opium or something? Do wizards even _have_ drugs?" It sounded crazy, like something Sherlock was just making up because he was bored, but at the same time, Sherlock didn't ever seem to have much of an imagination. Not _that_ kind of imagination, anyway. He didn't pull things out of thin air. He'd seen _something_ in the people at the tryout that didn't look like nerves, and just because John hadn't seen it didn't mean it wasn't there.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Come on, John, no one's done _opium_ for decades. And of course wizards have drugs. Well, 'controlled potions,' really, but they're a reasonable analogue to muggle drugs. And if they're going around the school, we've got to investigate!"

John rolled his eyes. "Wizards write with _quills_ on _parchment_. It's not _that_ ridiculous to think they'd do_ opium_. And anyway, my grandmother - wait a minute!" Sherlock was doing that thing again where he said things so matter-of-factly that you didn't question them until hours later, when you suddenly realized that whatever he'd talked you into was completely insane. This time, Sherlock had to be cut off at the pass, because investigating a drug ring sounded quite dangerous. "Sherlock, if there's _drugs_ going around, we've got to tell _Dumbledore_! We are _not_ just _investigating_."

Sherlock's eyes narrowed and he sighed like he was disappointed. "And what'll he do, John? He'll put all the ones who've taken the potions in detention and no one will let on where they got the stuff, and then they'll get out and it'll start all over again - no, we've got to find the _dealer_, John. And _then_ we can tell Dumbledore."

John hated himself for thinking it, but it almost made sense. If the school knew, officially, they'd have to act immediately, instead of rooting out the real problem. But didn't they still have to tell the teachers? Wasn't it still better to have everyone on the lookout before somebody got hurt over it? He bit his lip.

"Come on, John," Sherlock pleaded, "It's not like we're _never_ going to tell them. We're just waiting until we have all the facts. And anyway, we're only first years. We didn't even _go_ to Hogsmede. We can't _prove_ they took a controlled potion, and Dumbledore might not even believe us. What if he thinks we're just trying to get the others disqualified so that you can be on the quidditch team?"

John rolled his eyes, "I don't think he'd think _that_."

Sherlock raised an eyebrow, "But you don't know for sure _what_ he'd think. We have to be sure. We have to have proof." The longer Sherlock talked, the more sense it made, but John still had a vague feeling that this might be the dumbest thing he'd ever agreed to. Sherlock kept talking. "Look, John, I know you're worried about doing this, but-" he sighed, "Merlin, I can't believe I'm saying this - if we have to, we could always get Mycroft to help us. He's a 7th year and when he's not being awful he's actually a really talented wizard. I don't think there's anyone in the school who could beat my brother in a duel if it came down to it. I mean, except the teachers. And I bet Mycroft could take Professor Sprout if he had to."

John laughed, but he wasn't sure he thought it was funny. Sherlock rarely said anything positive about his brother and he _never_ talked about asking Mycroft for help. "You're really serious about this, aren't you? You really think it's the right thing to do."

Sherlock nodded. "I really do. I think if we tell the teachers now, they'll never get to the bottom of it. I think it'll push everything underground and the problem will still be there, but it'll just be harder to ferret out. And I think we can catch whoever's selling the stuff. It shouldn't be that hard."

John bit his lip. Part of him couldn't believe he was falling for this, whatever "this" was. Part of him could. "Ok," he said after a moment, "We'll investigate. But if we don't have anything when everybody gets back from the next Hogsmede visit, we have to tell somebody." Sherlock smiled. He didn't say anything. He didn't need to. For a moment, the boys looked at each other and then Sherlock spun on his heel and strode confidently off to talk to Lestrade.

* * *

**That's right, we have HP canon alignment! It's 1983, it's been two years since the fall of Voldemort, life has mostly gone back to normal for most people, and John, as a muggle-born, actually has no idea that such a person as the Dark Lord has ever existed, though Sherlock obviously does. The boys will be graduating in the spring of 1990, which is a year and a half before Harry & co start school.**


End file.
